


Left on the Steps of the FBI

by MintyBoi



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Adoption, Autistic Spencer Reid, Bullying, But he's doing pretty well, Gideon is not a good father, Homophobic Language, If Reid didn't have daddy issues, Kid Fic, Kidnapped Spencer Reid, Kidnapping, Male-Female Friendship, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Papa Rossi, Period Typical Attitudes, Protect the kids, Protective David Rossi, Rossi is a good father, Rossi is in over his head, Sorry Not Sorry, Spencer Reid is a Rossi, Threats of Violence, What if Spencer was just left on the steps of the FBI, will add more characters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-20
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 22:28:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 23,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26555113
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MintyBoi/pseuds/MintyBoi
Summary: Okay so the whole joke that Rossi says where he says Reid was left on the steps of the FBI... what if that happened. Rossi is the one who finds him and takes him in because of James Rossi never getting his chance.So this is literally a fic of Rossi adopting Spencer as a baby and raising him as his own. Being a dam good father too or at least he trys and is better then Gideon and Ryan on that point.Starts with Rossi getting Spencer and is going to go almost year by year from there.
Comments: 49
Kudos: 239





	1. 1979-1982

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so Rossi was born in 1956 but to get his qualifications in the Marines he would have had to be in the Marines for 8 years at least, then the BAU was founded (in the Criminal Minds universe) in 1978 so that would make him only 22, which would make him younger then Reid when he started. Working backwards from 1978 I’m following the Criminal Minds thing of founding the BAU after being in the FBI for a few years then I’m putting him at least 28 when he helped founding the BAU which puts his new birthdate at 1950. Yes this means that he is 57 when he comes back to the BAU in 2007 or whatever but in the show he would have been 51. I’m also changing around why Carolyn leaves him and when. So yeah I’m taking creative liberties to make the dates and qualifications on Rossi, probably Gideon and definitely Hotch make actual sense. Did you know the dates that are currently given makes Hotch graduate from University with a degree by age 19, I don’t think he skipped any grades…  
> Also most stuff I have in here is in some way researched. However obviously this is fan fiction and I don’t know a whole lot about the adoption process or proper procedures for leaving and coming back/sick time from the FBI so some stuff is made up based loosely on current facts.

Rossi was not someone who ever thought he would have children. He always saw all the ways that people preyed on kids. All the ways that him being absent for work would mess up a kid and make them into an unsubs that he had begun to study. So when Carolyn was pregnant he was completely freaked out by this realization. His first thought was to quit his job and start writing. He had a few rough manuscripts that he could edit up and send in to publishers, at least then he could be around for the kid. He had just helped Gideon and Ryan start up the BAU and was constantly swamped in work. Carolyn calmed his nerves by telling him that it would be okay, that they could figure it out, let’s finish one life changing thing before jumping into another. So they picked out baby names for potential girls and boys. Bought a crib and made the old guest bedroom into a cute nursery with moss green walls and yellow and white accents. After the baby shower they filled the rest of the nursery with the books, diapers, toys and other gifts given. Rossi had never thought he would want children, was now prepared to introduce this new child into the world. His case work was still picking up as the BAU was now still barely a year old, but he started to figure out how to best manage his time to make sure he could be at dinner with Carolyn at least twice a week. Once or twice he was even able to make it six out of the seven days. Their marriage seemed to be blooming more now than ever. 

Then at week 28, two whole weeks before the baby was due Carolyn went into labor. The baby was born a beautiful little boy. They named him James and watched as the doctors announced that he was dead the same day. Rossi went back to work the next morning and didn’t talk about it. Carolyn arranged a small funeral and there was a case that made him miss it. One day he came home to Carolyn’s friend helping her move boxes out of their house. She handed him divorce papers and a letter. The letter declared that while she would always love him she could not deal with the grief of losing her child and an absent husband at the same time. He didn’t question it at all and just signed the papers and made sure that the finances were split fairly. He went into his house and closed the door to the nursery, the room was not needed and he didn’t really feel the need to revert it back to a guest bedroom. He never really had guests of his own over anyway. He buried himself completely in work and a year later pretended he wasn’t jealous of Gideon having a healthy baby named Stephen. Then he pretended he didn’t feel angry at Gideon for almost being absent in his child’s life, never trying to cut down hours and going home to have dinners or hear his son’s first words. 

He was running late to work. It was Halloween and he was really hoping that there weren’t an influx in missing children tonight and tomorrow. He almost didn’t notice the woman who was setting a strange basket down on the steps to the building. 

“Hey!” He yelled and raced toward the woman, she seemed to hear him and stopped fussing over the basket rushing into the crowd. Rossi would have rushed after her except in that moment he heard a soft cry come from the basket. Looking into the basket he could see that it was a newborn baby wrapped tightly in blankets. The initials S.R. pinned to his front. Carefully he picked up the whole basket and wondered if it was possible to put a bomb in a baby basket like this. If someone would be that heartless to kill and baby. He decided to risk it and bring the baby at least inside the front where it was warmer than the harsh autumn breeze. When he came into the building security gave him a look of confusion. 

“This kid was just left on the steps. I couldn’t catch the woman who left. Uh, is there something we can do to test how old this kid is and where the baby could possibly be from?” 

“I guess?” Was the only reply and Rossi started to hand the basket over to the guard but something stopped him. 

“They wouldn’t have been able to put a bomb in with a baby right?”

“I don’t think there is a bomb in there.” Rossi still didn’t hand the baby over. 

“Do- do you think you could keep me updated? I would be willing help in anyway I can as well.” 

“Yeah of course. The medical team is coming now to access and probably take him to the hospital nearby.”

“Okay thank you…” Rossi trailed off looking for a name.

“Miller.” 

“Thank you Miller.”

With that Miller had the baby and Rossi went upstairs to the BAU in a fog. When he got there Ryan and Gideon gave him a strange look. 

“You’re late.”

“I just found a baby being abandoned on the steps into the building. It couldn’t have been more than a few days old. Passed it off to a security guard.”

Ryan and Gideon both looked at him like he lost his head. 

“Listen I know you never processed James’ death but if you need something…”

“What?” Rossi looked up the fog clearing, “No, no that did actually just happen I passed him off to some person named Miller he’s going to keep me updated. It was weird but it actually happened.”

They nodded politely and murmured words of reassurance before turning back to their case files. The world turned back to normal and Rossi continued looking at the horrors the world had to offer. He looked at cases where people had enough of everything and snapped. He wondered if that mother had just had enough. He wondered if he not ever taking apart the nursery and dating again was in some way delaying a snap of accepting reality. He pushed these to the back of his head and made calls and faxed papers and profiles to counties all over. He thought about how Gideon and Max wanted to interview criminals so that they could continue building more accurate profiles based on past people with the same patterns. The same patterns, he had seen his pattern with countless of parents that had lost children. Countless parents that then had snapped. But he had never heard dropping babies off to the government. Churches, hospitals and the occasional police department, if domestic abuse was involved, were all places people would normally drop off their children anonymously if they didn’t want to actually hand them over to the adoption agency themselves or get entered into the system. He knew that he had locked this part of his mind off long enough to not need it to be opened now. So he just continued with work like he always did. 

A week later Rossi was beginning to wonder if he had dreamed the whole thing. If this was a manifestation of the fact that he never really moved on or contemplated James’ death. Then Miller showed up and asked out loud to noone in particular, “Does anyone know where Agent Rossi is?” 

Gideon pointed to Rossi’s desk and Miller seemed to start at the realization that the person he was looking for was right in front of him. 

“Uh, the baby is fine. But the labs rushed DNA with people who gave birth to boys in the last couple days and then had their babies missing. Nothing. Either the mother didn’t go to the hospital or she truly isn’t looking for the kid. I’m here to say that he is going to get put up for adoption and hopefully because he’s so young there won’t be any problems with the process.”

“Oh okay. Where is he now?” 

Rossi didn’t know exactly how he did it. But next thing he found was him sitting down with the social worker and being able to convince her and the agency to let him adopt the little boy. He didn’t know why he was doing it except it felt right. He found out the kid had most likely been born on the 28th of October. A birth certificate was presented to him with the name spot still left blank. Rossi almost put James there before realizing this kid wasn’t James this was going to be a completely different person. He thought back to the initials that were found on the blanket, S.R.. He filled out the birth certificate as Spencer Reed Rossi. When he got home he called the office to let them know he would be taking a leave for a “birth of a child” which granted him about 12 weeks of no pay but also pretty much guaranteed he wouldn’t lose his job at least. Spencer was quiet just watching everything with wide eyes. Rossi realized how dusty the nursery was when he sneezed from just entering. So he found himself carefully arranging Spencer in the carrier before dragging out the crib and bringing it into the master bedroom. Taking a damp cloth he wiped the whole thing down and shook out the mattress and blankets. The diapers were luckily still in the plastic so he didn’t have to worry as much. He threw a load of baby clothes that looked about the right size in the wash before Spencer started crying for the first time. Grabbing the formula the agency had said the hospital had provided he approached the crying child. He held Spencer just like he had been taught and guided the bottle to the crying child’s lips just like he had been taught too. It felt like magic because Spencer just latched on and quieted down. Rossi just watched his new son and realized although he had barely gotten to be around Spencer and he had no clue what he was doing, he was willing to protect this child as a parent not as an FBI agent like in so many cases. 

The first 10 weeks passed by with little problem. Spencer was an easy baby and liked to sleep, whenever the rest of the time zone wasn’t sleeping. Rossi’s hours had become practically nocturnal. The baby would nap for long periods during the day and then almost sob throughout the night. Reading to him and talking to him seemed to help but not enough to actually get him through a whole night. When the sun rose he was out like a light half the time. Rossi decided it was the light. He started leaving the light on in Spencer’s room at night. Sure enough Spencer would sleep more. Still waking up but still better. However it also was a signal that his 12 week break was almost up. He needed to make plans for what would be done with Spencer when he couldn’t be there. He was currently planning to only go back part time, and also see if he could bring more work home. He also had found a daycare that took on infants and seemed safe. He would have to find other means if he was ever on an overnight case but he could also try not to take any as a part time worker until Spencer was older. He wondered what would happen to Spencer if he went out on a case and didn’t come home. He had called Carolyn multiple times in the past few weeks, for the first time in years. He never left a message past the first one that simply said, “Hey I know it's been a while. Just want to let you know I’m doing okay I think. I hope you are well.” Then he made a call to an old friend who he thought he would have never called again.

“Ray Finnegan, who's callin’ ”

“Ray, it’s Dave.”

“What the hell do you want? You're fed now. I don’t talk to feds.”

“Ray this has nothing to do with government or feds. I could not care right now. I just wanted to reach out to you and ask if you would be my son’s godfather. You’re probably my most trusted friend still and I don’t trust the people in my department or any of the other “fed” friends to actually take care of him if anything happens.” 

“Didn’t your baby die?”

“You keeping tabs on me?”

“Occasionally. People talk.”

“Well, a baby was dropped off practically to me and I adopted him. His name is Spencer.” 

“Dave if you're serious, bring him here and we’ll christen him. I would be honored.”

The phone was hung up before Rossi could say anything else. So that’s exactly what he did. That Sunday he found himself in a Catholic Church that he hadn’t thought he would ever be in again. There was no godmother, Ray said he arranged it with the priest earlier to make sure there were no complications. He also said that Emma had asked about Dave but also didn’t want to come without expressed invitation. Rossi was slightly relieved he wouldn’t have to face her, he loved her but she was married now. The baptism was a nice affair, Spencer was quiet in the car there and back. Ray had cooed over him before telling Rossi that he was expecting to see his godson at least once a month. Whether that meant Rossi came up or Ray went down. Rossi just agreed, he wasn’t going to limit whatever small amount of family he could get for both Spencer and him. 

Rossi found out that the BAU was more than willing to allow him to work from home if he took on just a few cases past what he would have been normally part time. Instead he worked from 8 a.m. till 3 p.m. Mondays-Thursdays then took home a whole load home to work into the night and as he watched Spencer. However it meant he didn’t miss his first word, “papa,” or when Spencer first started being more mobile. Instead he got to cherish these moments, he knew that Ryan didn’t understand it and Gideon didn’t approve of it but he didn’t care because Spencer was his biggest responsibility and care. The year passed quickly and Spencer’s vocabulary seemed to grow quickly and even his play seemed smart. He would organize things by color and cognitive toys that required for shapes to match up were only a problem when his aim was off. While he seemed smart, he was also extremely clumsy like any baby. 

For his first birthday party it was just Rossi and “Uncle Ray”. Gideon and Ryan had both handed Rossi gifts when at work the day before. Spencer seemed amazed at the colorful paper and was even more excited at the wooden blocks with numbers and letters carved into them. He also got extremely excited at the amount of sugar that he was getting. Rossi had originally been planning to take him trick or treating for Halloween but then had decided against it not having a costume for him and thinking that Spencer wouldn’t really remember nor appreciate it. 

The routine was easy to fall into and before he knew it Spencer was speaking more and more. He loved stories and looking at the words and letters even if he could not yet read. He was still extremely clumsy and accident prone. Baby proofing everything was something that was needed more than ever. If something was even mildly dangerous Spencer would somehow find it. It was like a nightmare to Rossi. But money was also starting to get a little tighter. So he went back full time. That meant that Spencer spent longer in day care but it was okay because he always was there to pick up before 6. When he had to do overnight or couple day cases he would drop Spencer off with Ray before rushing wherever he had to go. 

He started thinking about those written unpublished manuscripts he still had. From interviews with famous serial killers to other interesting cases. He submitted them to a publisher in hopes that they would sell. They did, not extremely well at first but they did bring in a good chunk of revenue. He started working on another manuscript in whatever small free time he could get on plane, bus and train rides. It wasn’t the life he ever imagined him living, but he wouldn’t trade it for the world. 


	2. 1983-1984

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I did research on early signs of autism because I do love the idea of Autistic Spencer. However on the spectrum I am leaning Spencer closer to Asperger Syndrome. If there is anything offensive that I accidentally have PLEASE CORRECT ME. I do know people with Aspergers and autism but I am not an expert on it AT ALL and still have to do a lot of research to try and write about it. Also the ASL thing that Ray and Rossi are going to do is based loosely off a family friend. Thanks!  
> Also I found out Stephen was named after David Stephen Rossi and I think that is kind of funny cause it shows just how much of Gideon’s life was controlled by his work. I apologize to anyone who likes Gideon… he isn’t a good father and while he is a good profiler and worker this is very much a fic that focuses on raising children so he isn’t shown in a good light.  
> These first two chapters are very much exposition, once I get to where Spencer is three the story is going to follow him as much as Rossi and getting more real father/son moments.

Spencer was still an easy kid but Rossi started feeling worried. It often felt like Spencer was always in his own world. Never meeting eye contact, getting upset when whatever system he had in place got messed up, and didn’t seem to really communicate what he wanted. Even with his vocabulary it felt more like he was parroting the words back to Rossi. When he was playing he wouldn’t acknowledge anyone else and if asked what he was doing it was like he didn’t hear. Ray had tried one time playing with him and accidentally upset what order he had the blocks in. Spencer’s head had snapped up and he cried out loudly before moving to try and put the block back in its place. Ray would often do his crosswords and just talk at Spencer instead. He would hold up as many fingers as the letters. Spencer slowly had started mimicking these back. If someone said five he would hold up his whole hand as a response. 

  
Rossi knew Spencer could hear, but still noticed that his son seemed more comfortable using symbols and signs to communicate. Never pointing just holding or arranging things in a certain way as if to get his message across. So Rossi learned ASL and started to teach it to Spencer. Just basics: eat, more, finish, father. The numbers would be a little hard for Spencer’s baby hands but he still showed them to him and often would ask verbally and non-verbally at the same time to get the best response. It was silly things like: Do you want three strawberries or do you want five strawberries? Spencer seemingly was okay with this because he would mimic back the hand shape he wanted. It was strange to Rossi because he didn’t think this was normal child behavior but he didn’t care. His son was unique so what, he still loved him. 

  
Ryan had started talking about how his wife was planning a divorce and was taking the kids with her. Gideon talked about how his marriage was rocky and he had missed Valentine’s day and Stephen’s birthday. Rossi talked about how quickly Spencer was learning. Ryan and Gideon looked at him like he had grown a third head. They had a few more people working in the BAU now Samuel Cooper and Katherine Cole. Rossi seemed to get along with them well enough but he socialized less with his co-workers now, trying to get as much work done so that he could focus on Spencer more. Cases regarding children often made him fear for Spencer now. He thought about how clumsy his kid was and all the problems he could accidentally cause and attract. He had to start compartmentalizing even more than normal to make sure he didn’t bring his home life into his work and vice versa. He began to wonder if that was why Ryan and Gideon and even himself with Carolyn had lost their marriages to the job. He thought about how Stephen was technically named after him. He reached out to Gideon’s wife, Ellen, asking if Stephen wanted to have a play-date with Spencer. 

  
She had agreed. He found himself at a really nice park watching Spencer and Stephen playing in the sandbox building something. Spencer seemed extremely unsure about the situation. Stephen seemed okay with teaching and being patient. After an hour of the boys playing, Spencer got hungry and started signing food again and again and cried loudly when Stephan tried to stop him. Rossi and Ellen picked up their respective children. Spencer seemed on the edge of a full breakdown. They agreed that they should do this again and it would be nice for the boys to be friends. They arranged for the next weekend before realizing that was Mother’s Day weekend. Rossi immediately backtracked saying that he understood if Ellen wanted to spend it with Gideon and her family. She just laughed and told him they could still meet up before she went over to her mother’s. 

  
Rossi didn’t even think about mentioning it to Gideon assuming he knew his family's schedule. Three months of play-dates later, Spencer was slowly getting better at playing and was walking more. He was still extremely clumsy but it didn’t matter. He got better at signing and speaking. He could now sign his numbers 1 - 10 but could only do them in order. So when he would say what number he wanted he would count up from one without fail. Ellen told him that it was impressive for a 22 month old. Those words made Rossi puff up with pride. Stephen was going to preschool in a month and Ellen was telling him all about the opportunities offered there and how it was so nice that it was 8 a.m. till 5 p.m. because it allowed her to not have to worry about childcare after it. She continued to ramble about her job and the “Mommy and Me” group she was in, how so many of the women were over the top about appearances and didn’t just let their kids go crazy and do what they wanted like Rossi let Spencer did. He looked up from watching Spencer at that.

  
“Do you think that makes me a bad parent?” He was almost scared to hear the answer. 

  
“Not at all, I think that makes you a better parent. You aren’t trying to push yourself on your child. Not for nothing but at least half of the women in the group have nannies and don’t even really know anything about their kid.”

  
Rossi realized she wasn’t just talking about her group anymore. He tried to think about the last time that he had actually heard Gideon talk about Stephen that wasn’t along the lines of ‘Ellen is mad that I missed something for Stephen’. He found he couldn’t. 

  
Rossi tried to turn his mind back towards Spencer and Stephen and away from this uncomfortable territory. 

  
“What am I doing wrong Dave? Why is it that you are able to raise a child by yourself and still do your work yet I can barely get a dinner once a week with Jason? I asked him if he would be to send Stephen off to preschool, he just asked me why he had to be there and that there would probably be cases.” 

  
Rossi tried to ignore the feeling of guilt as he watched the children play. He thought about Gideon’s constant indifference versus how much Ellen tried to get things to work. 

  
“I don’t know Ellen. I can’t give you those answers. I’m sorry.”

  
They fell into a silence. They watched Stephen roll a ball back and forth with Spencer. They weren’t talking yet seemed to have reached an understanding. 

  
A month later Gideon mentioned how Ellen was currently making him sleep on the couch because he missed Stephen’s first day of preschool. He said that he didn’t even realize what date it was. Rossi felt sick to his stomach because he thought about how that day was written on his own calendar and how he had wished Ellen and Stephen good luck the day before. That night when he picked up Spencer he wondered what type of father he would have been if he had raised James with Carolyn. Would he be a Gideon or would he still be himself? 

  
For Spencer’s second birthday the party was two people bigger than the previous year. Now Stephan and Ellen were there in addition to Ray. Spencer seemed fascinated and loved the colorful books he got. Ellen got him a soft fleece coat on the account it was getting colder, he petted the material and seemed to be amazed because he kept petting it even after putting it on. He fell asleep in it later that night with it over his pjs. 

  
Spencer had his first actual Halloween that year. Rossi was running late and apologized profusely to Ellen. Spencer had wanted to dress up as a dragon and Stephen had wanted to be a knight. Ellen had gotten them ready ahead of time having picked Spencer up from the daycare and taken both of them to the park after dinner. She waved it off and they went to about 30 houses before both boys seemed to be getting tired from all the movement and the fact that it was almost bedtime. Heading home Spencer had fallen asleep in the car, Rossi had just picked him up and put him in bed glad that the dragon costume also functioned as a onesie. He then went back out to the car and picked up the pillow case that held the candy. He pulled out a Milky Way bar for himself before putting the rest on the counter. His mind drifted towards “The Candy Man” who poisoned Pixy Stix, he dug through Spencer’s bag throwing away any of the offensive candy he could find. He then worked until almost midnight to make up for leaving work early and taking off Spencer’s birthday. He was willing to do it though. 

  
Midway through November Ellen brought food to Gideon at the office because he had forgotten to eat breakfast or take a lunch and she was worried. After dropping it off with Gideon and a kiss, she had come to Rossi’s desk. Rossi looked up and when she tapped him on the shoulder and she might not have noticed it but the atmosphere in the room changed with her next words.

  
“Ray is up this weekend right so we won’t be seeing Spencer?” 

  
“Yeah, Ray is taking him to the zoo. I don’t think Spencer would mind if Stephen wanted to tag along. Take a day off.”

  
She laughed at that and then Rossi realized every eye in the office was on him and Gideon looked like someone had just shot him. 

  
“A day off sounds nice, tell Ray I’ll drop Stephen off around noon fully fed.”

  
“Sounds like a plan, though Spencer eats at one so they will be getting lunch anyway.” 

  
She nodded and then walked out. Rossi pretended like he couldn’t feel the eyes and went back to his work. 

  
Gideon was at his desk in a second. 

  
“What was that?”

  
Rossi looked up trying to feint nonchalance, “Ray is taking Spencer to the zoo during Stephen and Spencer’s normal play-date time. I guess Stephen is going with them now.” 

  
“Normal play-date?”

  
Rossi could not keep the surprise off his face, “Yeah, Spencer and Stephan have been having play-dates on Sundays to the park and sometimes our houses since May. They have become really good friends actually. They went tricker treating together this year. Did you not know any of this?” 

  
“No.” 

  
That answer made Rossi realize exactly what this looked like. It looked like him and Ellen were having an affair. It made him look like a homewrecker instead of just the family friend that he currently was holding. He had to do damage control really quick before this got out of control. “Can I talk to you about this somewhere that isn’t in the middle of a bunch of nosy profilers?”

  
Gideon gave a nod, “Tonight after work.”

  
“I have to get Spencer. But I guess if you wanted to come over for dinner that would be fine.”

  
Gideon gave a nod before stalking back to his desk. Ryan seemed to notice that the office was still too curious and announced that everyone needed to get back to work. Rossi looked back down at his case. It was a classic narcissist personality who held a menial job and felt he wasn’t being appreciated. He also could tell this man probably worked with cars from the amount of motor grease on the victims. He submitted his profile and moved to the next case.   
Dinner with Gideon was tense. Even Spencer seemed to notice that as he quietly picked at his buttered pasta. 

  
“Please listen to the whole story before you draw any of your conclusions. I have absolutely nothing to hide and neither does Ellen.”

  
Gideon nodded, taking a bite of his food as if granting permission. 

  
“I wanted to find a friend for Spencer and thought about how Stephen is about his age. So I called your house phone one Sunday and got Ellen. She seemed fine with the idea of letting the boys get to know each other. So we met up and let them play for an hour. It went well and the boys seemed to like each other so we continued to meet up for the park. Once or twice she would drop off Stephen to this house for them to play or I would drop Spencer off to your house. I didn’t know that you didn’t know. In fact I know it's written on your home calendar as ‘play date with Spencer’ just like my calendar says ‘play date with Stephen’ and marks down that Ray is taking Spencer to the zoo this Sunday.”

  
“Who is Ray?”

  
“One of my old friends and Spencer’s godfather. He sees Spencer once a month. We normally go to church together.”

  
Gideon couldn’t seem to find any problems with anything Rossi was saying. So he just nodded his head idly. “You’re not fucking her right?”

  
“Jason!” Rossi said sharply, “My son! And no I’m not doing anything with your wife.”

  
“Okay,” Gideon conceded before getting up, “Thanks for the food but I think I need to talk to my wife and take a look at the calendar I didn’t realize existed.”

  
That Sunday Ray picked up Spencer and Stephen had been dropped off. The two boys seemed amazed by all the animals but while Stephan wanted to see the animals and watch how they moved, Spencer seemed to be fascinated with the map and the animals equally. He seemed to latch onto the colorful diagrams that were drawn about the habitats and even though there were a couple times where things got too loud for him and he pressed his hands roughly over his ears while seemingly trying to move in his stroller the day went without too many errors. Ray got the boys ice cream which ended up mostly down their fronts. Stephen decided his favorite animal was the tigers while Spencer was fascinated (much to Rossi’s dislike) by the snakes. He started to pretend hissing, while Stephen tried to roar. The two of them were completely exhausted by the time Ray dropped them back off to their respective homes at 6. Rossi took his grouchy child to the bathroom and gave him a bubble bath asking about the zoo.

  
To his amazement Spencer actually did tell him about it. It wasn’t the normal radio silence or parotting he was used to. Spencer started to babble on and on about the animals sleepily. Rossi looked on with pride and a smile as he tucked him in that night. He called Ray the next day to make sure he got home safe and to tell him the news of Spencer actually talking more. 

  
After that little mishap with Gideon, Rossi was given two things by the fates for the Christmas season. One was that his two books were selling well and he now was actually getting a decent amount of money. The second was the death of his last living relative in America meaning all the Rossi family money and estates (which was a lot) came to him. He had previously been cut off for “joining the government” but they had never taken him off the will if they all died. He now had a lot more money. He thought about Spencer and going part-time again, but he was making this work wasn’t he? There was no reason to cut down on his work, he liked his work and he was making the world safer for his son. But maybe he could go hunting again or take a vacation of some sort. He wondered how Spencer would feel about moving. As Spencer grew Rossi had started to realize that the house still had ghosts for time things that he had just decided to ignore but they didn’t want to be ignored much longer. 

  
The last thing that was given to him for Christmas was a letter from Carolyn. It read that she was sorry that she hadn’t responded to the phone call over two years ago and broke their promise of always being there for each other even when split. She hoped the letter found him in good faith and that he was healthy. She said that she was doing well. 

  
He sent her back a card with a picture of Spencer. He detailed it about Spencer’s life and how he was currently thinking about moving because the ghosts had finally caught up to him. 

  
1984 was nothing like the book. Not for Rossi at least. By February he had found and moved into a very nice new home. It was big but still smaller than his childhood home of a literal mansion. Spencer didn’t seem to like the change at first, however he slowly adapted. When Stephen’s birthday party rolled around Spencer went with Rossi. There were lots of the kids from Stephen’s preschool and some of the mothers asked Ellen if Stephen and Spencer were brothers from how close they were and the fact that none of the other children knew Spencer. Some mothers seemed to think that Rossi was Stephen’s father from how Stephan ran over to get Rossi when a kid got stuck behind the couch. They both fielded off these inquiries with just being good family friends. It was not unnoticed by either of them that Rossi had been able to get his schedule to work around being here while Gideon hadn’t. Stephen had Spencer help with unwrapping his presents when he noticed his friend’s interest in the wrapping paper. Rossi took a few pictures to hang up in his new home and to show to Ray who hadn’t been able to visit Spencer this month.   
  
The “Beauty Queen Killer” just showed Rossi again how sick this world was and why he had to make sure he continued to clean it for Spencer. Just another reminder of why he couldn’t just go part time again why he needed to stay in full and keep to the system. He thought about how he would have to teach Spencer to be cautious around adults and not listen to false promises. He hoped that Spencer would be smart enough to tell the truth from the lies.   
The play dates with Stephen continued. Then in May Ellen showed him a photo that Stephen had supposedly drawn. It was four crudely drawn stick figures at some sort of house building, there was a yellow spot in the sky that Rossi assumed was the sun. 

  
“That’s a nice picture. Spencer keeps breaking his crayons because he pushes too hard.”

  
“The teacher had asked everyone to draw their families because they read a book about how all families are different.”

  
Rossi counted the figures again, four two larger two smaller, and got a sinking feeling in his stomach. “That’s you, Stephen, Spencer and me isn’t it.”

  
Ellen looked ahead at the boys and just nodded with slight tears in her eyes, “The teacher asked him who was in his picture so she could label it. He told her ‘Mommy and me’ pointing to the first two. Then he pointed to the next two and told her ‘Rossi and Spencer.’ When she asked if Spencer and you were his brothers he said that you were Spencer’s father and that Spencer was his best friend. The teacher thought that maybe you were a step-parent and tried to ask that. Stephen told her that…” She took in a shuddering breath, “Stephan told her that you live in a different house and that daddy barely comes home. I had to have a conference with her about our home life because she was concerned that he was possibly getting confused by a divorce or an affair. I was so embarrassed.”

  
“Ellen, I’m so sorry,” Rossi didn’t know what to say past that.

  
Ellen gave a small chuckle still looking right ahead watching the two boys play with chalk, “That wasn’t even the worst part. The worst part was that both parents were supposed to come. I told her we would be there and Jason promised to be there but he completely forgot. He didn’t even have a field case or something else that would require him to cancel, he just forgot. I had to sit there trying to explain this all to a preschool teacher on why my husband who said he would be there was M.I.A. while my child drew you almost in his place.” 

  
They both didn’t get to elaborate because Spencer started to decide to see if chalk tasted good. Upon realizing it didn’t he started to cry. Stephen was making the shushing sounds that he had heard adults make when a kid was crying. Rossi raced over with some water in his hand. That was it for the day as Ellen guided Stephen into starting to clean up. 

  
“Ellen if you want to stop or have the boys play less, I’ll understand.”

  
The look on her face was one of confusion, “I’m not sacrificing Stephen, Spencer and my happiness so that Jason can continue to miss out.” 

  
With that she had picked up Stephen and was walking away. Rossi realized that Gideon probably didn’t even know about the actual picture, he just knew that the teacher wanted to talk. He wondered how much Gideon actually knew about his home life anymore. When the divorce papers were brought up to him from both sides three months later he wished he could have said it was a surprise. Rossi tried to be sympathetic and available for both parties. In the end though he found himself being at odds with Gideon. 

  
In August the daycare center said that Spencer had a big melt down that day. They didn’t know what triggered it exactly as all the kids were playing like normal but Spencer had covered his ears and curled in on himself moving back and forth. She also said he screamed when a teacher picked him up to bring him to a different room. They thought maybe he was tired and the room was just too loud for some reason. 

  
Spencer’s third birthday came and went similar to his second, the only differences was the age and that Carolyn sent a birthday card. Spencer made less of a mess while eating but both Stephen and him had such a sugar rush afterwards that made it virtually impossible to get them to settle down and watch a movie. Instead they took them to the park. In the darkening park Spencer and Stephen raced around and then wanted to play hide and seek with everyone. Ray agreed to seek first on Spencer’s request and each of the parents tried to hide where they could still see their child. Ray purposefully found Rossi first but pretended he couldn’t see Spencer. Then he found Ellen and continued to pretend he couldn’t find the little ones. Ellen and Rossi were sitting on the “found” bench, while Ray pretended to be puzzled. When he found Stephen he lifted him high in the air while joking, “Gotcha!”

  
Stephen tried to get free laughing before running back to Ellen and Rossi. Then Ray slowly crept over to where Spencer had been hiding. There was no Spencer. Ray looked all around the bush he had been hiding behind. Nothing. He looked back to Rossi and Ellen with wide eyes raising his hands in a “I don’t know.” Rossi started looking for Spencer’s purple shirt peeking out anywhere. That’s when he noticed a little bit of purple sticking out from a conifer, he pointed it out to Ray who crept over. However when he went to grab Spencer, Spencer jumped and not expecting it Ray didn’t catch him. He landed on the sidewalk hard.   
Rossi and Ray immediately raced over while Ellen held Stephen back searching through her purse for band-aids. Spencer’s hands and knees were scraped from the concrete and he had a small hole in his pants now but he was smiling.

  
“I won!” 

  
“Yeah, passerotto you did. You won,” Rossi agreed, happy for a not crying child, “Does anything hurt?”

  
“Nope!” Spencer hid his hands behind his back. 

  
Rossi just rolled his eyes and picked him up, “Well winners get a bubble bath!” 

  
Ray seemed apologetic but Rossi just shook his head, if Spencer wasn’t gong to admit that he was hurt he wasn’t going to have anyone apologizing. Ellen came over with band-aids that he shook off too. It was time to go home. 

  
Halloween that year was not as easy as the previous year. Stephen was determined to go to more houses and Spencer wasn’t willing to leave until Stephen was done. They ended up doing two whole streets in Rossi’s new neighborhood which meant better candy because the neighbors were richer. They both dressed as pirates and everything would have gone fine except Stephen had invited another friend with him. Stephen’s friend’s name was Mike and he was dressed as Peter Pan. Mike didn’t get that Spencer sometimes got overwhelmed and that he did a strange mix of ASL and speech to get what he wanted. Mike didn’t understand why Stephen kept asking for things for Spencer and why Spencer was always one step behind Stephen. Mike also didn’t understand why when he pushed Spencer down because Spencer was taking up Stephen’s attention, why Spencer didn’t cry but instead got really tense and started to curl into himself. Yet the adults seemed to take this as if Mike had just hurt him, he wasn’t hurt. Stephen got upset at the fact that one of his friends pushed another friend because that was against the rules. Also his mom was always telling him he needed to be nice to Spencer because Spencer had problems. This is what ended the night as then Mike didn’t want to continue, Stephen was upset and Spencer was confused by all the commotion and then got overwhelmed by it. He fell asleep as soon as he calmed down enough so Rossi didn’t get to talk to him about it. 

  
The next morning Spencer acted like nothing had happened and just continued their morning routine. Rossi made a decision that if Spencer didn’t seem affected he wouldn’t address it. Instead he asked Spencer if he would want to go to preschool this coming winter for the second half of the school year, Ellen had given him the paperwork. Spencer was extremely excited at the idea of going to preschool with Stephen and started repeating different things Stephen had told him as if they were his own words and facts. Rossi just listened and laughed until they pulled into the daycare and dropped Spencer off at his room. 

  
“Have a good day passerotto.”

  
That year for Christmas Spencer asked if he could help make the cards. Rossi and him spent a weekend coloring cards and pictures for as many people as Rossi could think to send cards to. Then Spencer asked when the list was done,  
“Letter for Bun-tie? Letter for Man-mansoon?”

  
“Who passerotto?”

  
“Book people.” While mimicking how Rossi looked when he was working on his manuscripts. 

  
Rossi understood immediately. He was currently writing about people he had interviewed. The most recent ones were Ted Bundy and Charles Manson. He did not want his son writing to criminals. 

  
“Um… those people aren’t good people kiddo. We only write cards to our friends and good people. They are like the villains in our stories.”

  
Spencer didn’t seem to think this was an acceptable answer, “Say sorry and be friends.” That was a lesson he had learned in daycare word for word. 

  
Rossi buried his head in his hands before realizing he could just lie to Spencer and not send the letters because he really didn’t want to get in an argument about right and wrong and other topics that were way too old for Spencer. 

  
So Spencer colored in two more cards for the two criminals that he had heard his father just mention one too many times around him. He never knew that Rossi just slipped them into his desk drawer at work, not willing to throw out Spencer’s drawings but also not wanting Spencer to ever find out the lie. 


	3. 1985

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes: We get to see the beginning of child prodigy Spencer! Okay so fun facts, signs of a child prodigy is being extremely knowledgeable in specific interests and not being able to get along with others. So um…. really similar to early signs of autism. Either way they also tend to have a scary good memory which has already been started to be shown by Spencer literally communicating almost exclusivity through parroting back phrases or signs. It also means that Spencer gets to learn how to read and Rossi starts to realize that his child is perhaps smarter than the average child.  
> Also I do not know Italian and any I have is google translated. While this may seem like a lot for a child to be learning, ASL, english, and Italian I have met and worked with 3 and 4 year olds of completely normal intelligence who already speak two languages fluently and I was teaching ASL to and were picking it up extremely quickly. This age is great for kids learning a language because they soak it up like a sponge.  
> Also just because Spencer is book smart doesn’t mean he has any self preservation skills and will give Rossi three heart attacks a week.

Spencer went to his first day of preschool for the second half of the school year. Stephen was just as excited and kept telling Spencer all the amazing things they would get to do. Spencer just kept smoothing down his sweater.

“You okay passerotto?” Spencer didn’t look up, he just continued his action, “Spence?” 

He looked up with some tears, “I don’t know.” 

Rossi carefully took him aside and sat down with him, “If you want to stay in daycare for the rest of the year that’s okay. Do you want to go back to daycare or do you want to go with Stephan?”

Spencer didn’t respond in any way. 

Rossi sighed and held up two fists, “This hand,” he shook his left fist, “is for daycare. And this one,” he shook his right fist, “is starting preschool today with Stephen. It means that you are going to have to stay with Ellen for an hour in the morning and an hour after preschool but then I will come pick you up at the same time as daycare.” 

He didn’t really think Spencer understood all of that but he was willing to explain because the calm environment seemed to be relaxing Spencer. Spencer bumped his right fist with his own. A small smile seemed to come out. 

“Same time?” He asked quietly.

“Same time,” Rossi agreed. 

Turned out that preschool was a blessing for Spencer. He loved the routine of it and while the teachers told Rossi that he was having problems getting along and playing with the other kids he seemed to be excelling in all the cognitive games they had and was fascinated especially by the rug that had a fake neighborhood map and also the puzzles. They told Rossi that he had a very smart little boy and they wouldn’t be surprised if he skipped a few grades when he was younger. Rossi swelled with pride at those words. He looked at the wooden blocks that Spencer had gotten when he got home from the meeting. 

That following Saturday he told Spencer they were going to play a new game. He knew that Spencer already knew the ABC song because Stephen sang it all the time. He had tried to teach Spencer what letters were what a couple times but never really thought much of it later. He knew that at daycare they had the alphabet up on the walls, same with his preschool room. 

First Rossi sang the ABC song to Spencer holding up the corresponding block for every letter. Then he put all the blocks in order and tapped them one by one while singing, this time he had Spencer sing with him. Then he messed up the blocks and left the room as if to grab a snack. He hoped Spencer would see it like a puzzle and maybe recognize it from his classrooms. He knew he was being way too hopeful but he was curious by what the teachers said. He made peanut butter sandwiches and cut them into four triangles, it was the only way to get him to eat a sandwich. When he went back into the playroom with the sandwiches he found Spencer singing the ABCs softly to himself touching each corresponding block that he had put back in order. Rossi thought about how Spencer had memorized counting but just stopped when he got to the right number. 

“Spence, can you show me the letter S?”

Spencer seemed to go right to it, the curved letter displayed proudly in his hand. 

“Good job!” Rossi was amazed that this idea was going better than he expected. 

Rossi arranged the letters to spell cat, “Spence what letters are these?”

Spencer looked at the letters before responding, “C-A-T.”

Rossi nodded encouraging, “That’s really good, passerotto.”

Spencer was smiling to himself. 

Rossi pointed to the blocks, “Those letters spell out Cat.”

“Books?”

“Yeah like the words in the story.”

Within a month he was teaching Spencer simple words with blocks. The kid seemed to take one look and remember it. Rossi wasn’t sure how he did it but he wasn’t going to complain, it just made his son more unique. 

Rossi began to integrate italian into his conversations with Spencer. Soon Spencer could communicate with Rossi by parroting back italian, english or ASL. The only problems arose when he did not realize everyone couldn’t understand italian and ASL and often teachers had to remind him to communicate what he needed in english. 

Spencer’s knack for words and remembering their order also came through with puzzles, he would study the picture of what was supposed to be made and then would be able to put together the puzzles as if by a memory of the picture. Puzzles was the only thing Stephan refused to do with Spencer because “Spencer already knows how to do it.” 

Carolyn had started to send him little riddles and jokes in letters that they exchanged with Rossi’s help. He was amazed and loved the challenges they posed, even if he never really knew the answers. His favorite parts seemed to be the explanations that Rossi would give him to why. Ray started doing little kid crosswords to Spencer to help teach him in a similar fashion. He also showed Spencer sudoku how he had to have one of every number, though Spencer did it with colors, in every box and row and column without any repeats. When given 9 different colors and a book of them he seemed to quickly latch on and get the hang of them. 

He was working on one of his sudoku puzzles the first time he met Gideon. It was the weekend before Stephen’s birthday and Ellen had decided they were going to have a “family” party that Sunday and then the actual birthday party with all the kids the following weekend after his birthday. Stephen was sulking because he wasn’t allowed to open his presents yet because his birthday wasn’t for another three days so Spencer had settled down with his crayons and beginner sudoku book that Ray had given him. When Gideon appeared having walked around to the back of the house no one noticed him at first. Stephen and Spencer were closest to him but with their backs turned. Stephen was picking at the grass with a sour expression and Spencer seemed content with his book, the adults were all chatting away not really paying attention. 

“Stephen.”

Stephen’s head snapped up and Spencer jolted at the sudden movement looking at his friend. The adults also turned at the new voice. Ellen’s face went pale. Sure she had sent an invite to Gideon but considering he hadn’t even shown up for one of his visitations in the past four months she hadn’t expected him to show. 

“Dad?” Stephen asked. 

Gideon stood there surveying the scene with a small gift bag in his hand: his son, his ex-wife, a coworker and his son, some of his ex-in-laws and a few of his ex-wife’s close friends. Rossi could feel his discomfort and how out of place he felt radiating off his body. 

“Yeah, Stephen. Just wanted to say happy birthday,” He almost sounded unsure, nothing like the man that talked and stared down killers. 

“Thanks!” Stephen jumped up hugging his dad tight, “I missed you! Mom said that you were still too busy to visit. She told me not to expect you!”

“Surprise!?” Gideon chuckled hugging back before dislodging the child and handing him the small present, “I got you something.” 

“Thanks!” Then with a conspiratorial grin, “Can I open it now?”

“Ye-” Gideon started when Ellen cut him off. 

“Stephen John Gideon, I told you you couldn’t open gifts until your birthday. So no you can’t open it now.”

Gideon immediately looked like he wanted to disappear even more and Stephen deflated a little. Gideon pretended to be interested in what Spencer was doing to change the topic. 

“What are you doing there?” 

“He’s playing sudoku! Ray taught him. I don’t understand it, but Spencer’s good at all sorts of puzzles! The teachers say he’s super smart!” Stephen started happily talking about his friend and also happy to get to talk to his dad about anything. 

“Wow that’s impressive,” Gideon said, still watching Spencer with an interest Rossi didn’t like, “What do you like to do, Stephen?”

All the adults turned back to their previous activities but their conversation had died, they kept an eye on Gideon with a chatting Stephen and a working Spencer until food was served. Stephen would later open up his presents to find baseball tickets, tickets that even though Gideon had originally bought to attend with Stephen Ellen would take him instead. Stephen would also talk about how his dad came to visit for the next month to anyone who would listen. 

Rossi had always heard that the ages 2-5 were the terrible toddler years. He had not bought into this as Spencer just seemed like a miracle child, smart and a quick learner even if he was a bit clumsy and still pretty much only spoke in words and phrases he had previously heard like a parrot. However when Rossi went to the bathroom one time while Spencer was playing to come back out and find that Spencer had memorized the buttons to press to unlock the gunsafe and had taken out his firearm, he almost had a heart attack. He thanked God, Jesus and every saint he could think of that he had remembered to unload his gun and that Spencer hadn’t tried to load it. That night he talked to Spencer about how he shouldn’t touch guns until he was older, at least 10. He then changed the pincode and made sure Spencer couldn’t see it. 

Rossi didn’t think anything of it until Ray was white in the face when he dropped Spencer off after one of Rossi’s overnight cases. He told Rossi that he had left Spencer to play with his blocks and crayons and next thing he knew Spencer had gotten into his safe with a dial. Ray wouldn’t say what was in that safe, claiming that Rossi was better not knowing but was concerned that this child was able to so easily get into these things. Rossi told him to change the code and just make sure that he never entered it when Spencer was watching. Spencer just continued to trace routes in the city map that Ray had given him for the car ride to keep occupied, completely oblivious to the panicked adults. 

That May in preschool Rossi encountered his second main problem. Everyone was making Mother’s Day cards. Spencer had no one to make one for and told the teachers that. They told him he could make cards for any special females in his life or he could make a card for his dad. That day he gave Ellen a Mother’s Day card when she came to pick him and Stephen up. She took it and smiled saying a simple thank you. Stephen seemed ecstatic by this. 

“If Pen is giving you a Mother’s Day card does that make us brothers? Can me and Pen be brothers?” 

Ellen just laughed and tucked the card away with another thank you. When Spencer was picked up by Rossi later Ellen brought it up. Rossi nodded saying that it was very nice of Spencer and it seemed their little picture problem had come full circle. 

When they had gotten home Spencer seemed nervous about something. Rossi was not use to seeing Spencer ever nervous around him and became worried, he tried to not let it show as he asked, “What’s wrong passerotto?” 

“I made two cards,” Spencer whispered softly. It was one of the first sentences that Rossi realized couldn’t have just been parroted back from something else. 

“Oh?” He tried to seem surprised but not interested like it didn’t really matter or affect anything. 

“Ellen and Carolyn.”

Rossi wanted to laugh, of course the kid who tried to send killers Christmas cards would end up making Mother’s Day cards for his ex-wife who Spencer had never actually met. 

“I’m sure she will love it. Did you want to send it to her passerotto?” He spoke softly crouching down so they were at eye level, Spencer gave a shy nod before reaching into his bag and pulling out a card with a big heart drawn on the front and a bunch of stickers of the letter C. 

Carolyn would never admit it but she cried when she got the card. That year she promised she would find a reason to meet Spencer. She thought about her own lost son, she wondered if he would have loved her as much and made her these types of cards. 

Summer came around and Rossi had his second almost heart attack. It happened at Stephen’s first soccer game after a week of soccer camp. Spencer had been playing in the back of the spectators. Some game he made himself with rocks and the little rolly pollys he had found. Rossi kept looking over before continuing to cheer on Stephen in the completely unorganized fake soccer. Rossi looked over again to see Spencer with a man who was crouching seeming to talk to Spencer. Something felt off but in that moment Ellen yelled out at Stephen who had managed to kick the ball in the goal so his focus was diverted. The whole crowd cheered, he turned back to look at Spencer. Spencer wasn’t there. Rossi immediately darted over to where Spencer just was to realize that his child was on the other side of a rock he was next to counting. 

“Hey Spence, what are you doing?”

Spencer seemed annoyed that his counting got messed up and with all the noise coming from the game Rossi could tell he was about to be overwhelmed again. He quickly scooped him up and started walking him over towards the cars. 

“Sir! Sir!” A man, the same man that had been talking with Spencer was coming over, “Where are you going with him, sir.”

“He’s my son, he was getting overwhelmed with all the noise from the game so I’m bringing him to the car to calm down.” 

“Can you prove he’s your child sir? Because right now I just see an upset child being carried by a man who wasn’t near him a few minutes ago.” 

Rossi’s red flags started going up. “Hey Spence, why were you counting?”

“Hide ‘n Seek,” Spencer said muffled into Rossi’s collar. 

“Who were you playing with?” 

The man was fast approaching and seemed to have every mind to get Spencer away from Rossi. 

“Gary.”

Rossi looked sharply up, “Is your name Gary?”

The man stopped short, “Yes?”

“Well my name is Agent David Rossi with the FBI and I’m going to suggest you don’t randomly go around asking kids to play hide and seek with you that you don’t know. Now I’m going to take my son to my car and you are not going to follow us.” Rossi reached into his back pocket and pulled out his ID. The man went wide eyed before backing off and disappearing. 

A week later a kid about Spencer’s age went missing from that same park. Rossi came forward as a witness saying that a man named Gary had approached Spencer a week prior. They were able to find the residence of the man, the boy was already dead. That night Rossi held Spencer close. The next morning he taught him to never go off with anyone who wasn’t Ray or Ellen or that Rossi had told Spencer in advance about. He told him to not play with strangers without telling whoever he was being watched by. 

Rossi wondered if the kid being so smart made him a bad luck magnet, like some balance to even out the good and bad. He surely hoped not and at church that week he prayed to St. Nicholas that Spencer would be safe. 

The teachers at the preschool had suggested having Spencer take a cognitive test to see if he could enter school a year early. It was a good idea because that fall Spencer and Stephen got to get on the bus together for their first day of school and kindergarten. Rossi pretended he wasn’t crying, Ellen cried openly. That day when Rossi went to work late and told everyone about how Spencer just got on the bus the first time Katie Cole told him congratulations. 

Gideon looked at him and said, “I thought it was Stephen’s first year, not Spencer’s.”

“It’s both,” Rossi had replied. 

Spencer excelled in kindergarten. He easily could tell his letters and even spell basic words with help. Writing was coming along well and he could now count up to 100 like all the other kids. The kindergarten teachers told Rossi that they wouldn’t be surprised if after Spencer started to actually read he skipped at least one more grade,, but reading wouldn’t be learned until first grade, so kindergarten it was. 

Even though he was a year younger and Stephen did most of his talking with the other kids he found himself making friends with kids that Stephen made friends with. Now being in the same class together Stephen and Spencer were joined at the hip and almost nothing could get them to separate. So when Rossi’s first overnight case came up during a school week, Ellen was perfectly fine with taking Spencer instead of having Spencer be dropped off at Ray’s. 

That October was hard, there were a lot of “satanic cults” and they only got worse the closer it got to Halloween. Rossi began to panic that he would have to miss Spencer’s birthday or Halloween due to this satanic panic as the press was calling it. He was able to narrowly get back a day before Spencer’s birthday. Carolyn came as a surprise and Spencer acted like he just met a famous person, wide-eyed and amazed that she had appeared. Stephen asked if Carolyn was Spencer’s version of ‘dad’ and then Ellen decided it was time for cake. Carolyn had brought Spencer a joke book for his birthday. He gave her a big hug and she tried to not think of James. One look to Rossi gave her the same story. 

However he did end up having to miss Halloween due to a drug case in LA. Spencer went out with Carolyn and Ellen dressed as a red widow spider. Ellen had helped sew it and Stephen had wanted to be a scorpion. The two of them also learned about sneakily eating candy while they tricker treated, meaning they both ended up with too much sugar and a bellyache. 

The case was hard. It had ended up being an addict who was killing to get a fix. Rossi heard about a drug in LA that was getting sold cheap and was causing huge problems. The profilers were told to keep their eyes out for cases involving Cocaine as it was spreading. The New York Times had just started calling it Crack. Rossi went home thinking about how these drugs were pure evil and drug addicts a dangerous symptom to the disease. He held Spencer close to his chest that night while they read a story about a little bear that was sick and all the ways that his friends take care of him. Rossi wondered if any of the addicts had anyone to take care of them and help them get back on their feet or if they were just going to become another profile that couldn’t ever be helped. If this type of unsub was going to become as popular as a serial killer. That night after he tucked Spencer into bed with a kiss he promised himself if Spencer ever got into that trouble he would still take care of him. He shook his head at the thought, he would raise Spencer better so that Spencer didn’t turn to drugs to start with. 

That Christmas cards were sent and Spencer didn’t forget Ted or Charles. Rossi just laughed before tucking the new cards in his desk. They went out to pick out a tree and Rossi cut it down. Spencer had made some ornaments in class that they hung on the lower branches. Rossi gazed at his son working on perfecting the letters ‘k’, ‘z’ and ‘n’ and decided even with all the stress of the year he wouldn’t have it change for any price.


	4. 1986

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:  
> So I got a little too attached to Rossi… which is good but it does mean that this is going to definitely be much more from his perspective as he raises Spencer. We are going to hear his thoughts more and what he notices.  
> There will be occasions and scenes I have written out for the future that are much more just Spencer. Such as times when Spencer is at school and Rossi isn’t there, but for the most part it is going to be a more Rossi POV as he tries his absolute best to raise Spencer to the best of his ability.  
> DISCLAIMER: I showcase some teacher’s being pretty rude about single parent households and traditional household values. These do not reflect my ideas, I am using this based off the time period and the fact that people are not all accepting. Also because people tend to be more okay with single-mother then single-father households which is something that I thought should be addressed.  
> Also warning for threats and mentions of violence, there is no actual violence but there are mentions of it.

The start of the year was a parenting nightmare. A stomach bug and the flu took Spencer’s class with a vengeance. Spencer ended up home sick puking and running a fever of 101. Rossi had to take a week off from going in, instead bringing lots of cases home and trying to do as much work as he could from there. Spencer was not a fussy child, even when sick. The problem was his desire to keep going to school. Rossi had to deal with tears and silence when he told him he would have to stay home another day. When he would ask Spencer how he was feeling Spencer would tell him ‘he felt good enough for school,’ everytime. So Rossi had to rely solely on external factors and also knowing that his child was lying. It was the first time Spencer had ever lied to him. He let Spencer watch The Rescuers, The Aristocats and The Hobbit on repeat while he worked. Spencer seemed fascinated by the strange creatures in the Hobbit, while Rossi couldn’t help but think of all the satanic cults. Spencer seemed drawn to the music in the Aristocats, while Rossi thought about all the ways people were willing to get money. Spencer loved the Rescuers for how they caught the bad guys just like his dad, while Rossi wondered why his job couldn’t be that easy and why people normally were so much more perverse with children then slave labor. 

When Spencer got to go back to school he was a ball of energy that would not be stopped. For once he actually woke up before Rossi and practically dragged the man to the car, not even letting him stop to finish his coffee. Getting to the office that day meant looking at all the files that had to still be finished, Rossi called Ellen asking if she would be willing to feed Spencer and keep him just for an extra two hours, he would pay her for it. Ellen waved off his money saying they were practically family. 

That sentiment was grounded a little more when Rossi was there for Stephen’s birthday for yet another year and he brought Gideon’s present with him. It had been dropped off on his desk a day previous. Rossi didn’t ask or answer questions. 

March was the first threat Rossi ever got concerning Spencer. He was used to getting threats or taunts from criminals when he started closing in but this criminal sent him three addresses: his home, Ellen’s home, and Spencer’s school. With the addresses was a time table detailing Spencer's day as could be seen from the street, but also had his bedtime which was off by a half hour but did mean he watched the lights in the house. Rossi had to alert Ellen and Gideon about this. Ellen, Stephen and Spencer all ended up at a safe house for a week before they caught the man. His name was William Grace, Rossi would later swear that he had the face of “pure evil”. Though his opinion was most likely extremely biased because Grace had told Rossi in excruciating detail exactly what he would have done to Spencer. He explained every little detail of how he would savor leaving pieces of Spencer for him to find at every crime scene, how he would make sure Spencer stayed alive as he took fingers, ears, toes, eyes and limbs. That he would kill Spencer by mailing his heart to Ellen and his brain to Ray and leave the rest of the body in the trash outside of Rossi’s house. He said he wanted to be the man who broke David Rossi, who forced his home life and work life to exist as one: just like all the other profilers. Grace said he had been excited to get Rossi because he was the only one who seemed to not just be tied exclusively to their work, therefore he was more satisfying to play with. Rossi made sure Grace got death row with no exceptions and no possibilities for a deal of any kind. Rossi went to church that week and taught Spencer about heaven and hell. 

Another Mother’s Day came around and this time when Spencer made two cards the teachers asked if his father was remarried. Spencer didn’t understand, he had only ever seen single parents, what was being married? Stephen jumped in to tell Spencer and the teachers that his mom helped take care of Spencer and Spencer’s version of ‘dad’ was this nice lady who wrote him letters. The teachers scheduled parent teacher conferences with Rossi and Ellen. 

“Mr. Rossi, Spencer is a very bright child but I have some concerns about his home life.”

Rossi could already see where this might be heading. 

“Spencer made two cards for Mother’s Day and while that is fine, kids have step-parents. Kids don’t normally make cards for other people’s Mother’s and a parent who is no longer in the picture.”

“Wait what parent isn’t in the picture?”

“Carolyn, he calls her?”

“She’s my ex-wife, we got a divorce two years before Spencer was born. She just sends him cards and they have a pen-pal system set up. He made her a card last year because the daycare teachers told him he could make cards for ‘women in his life’ if he didn’t have a mom. This is probably why he did that again.”

The teacher nodded, “Okay, but you might want to talk to Spencer about how he doesn’t technically have a mother at least. Or explain to him that these women aren’t his mother.”

“He knows. But Ellen is fine with it she told me last year and Spencer and Stephen practically act like siblings.”

“About Stephen, he might be confusing Spencer. He told us that Carolyn is like Spencer’s version of his ‘dad’.”

“We had to deal with that problem in the past, we are aware it exists. Spencer isn’t confused by it and Carolyn isn’t upset by the fact she is a ghost parent. We had lost a son, that’s what’s ended the marriage, I think Spencer’s letters help fill some of that grief. I do not see how Spencer finding trustworthy maternal figures that are technically appropriate being a bad thing.” 

“It can create a social imbalance in a child,” The teacher started. Rossi held up a hand, he had not been studying the unbalanced members of society for the past eight years to be told his own son was one because of having too many people who love him and him loving them. 

“With all respect, I have been studying human behavior and especially how childhood can affect the later years and functioning in society. I know that Spencer might not be the most ‘normal’ of children and his home situation is also unique. However none of this is overall affecting the fact that he is radiating love and is loved in return.”

“Mr. Rossi, I’m not criticizing your parenting methods and I know Spencer is a special situation partly for being so bright and also you being a single parent. I also know that children require a steady maternal and female presence that is their own and not someone else's. It helps them be more empathic and takes care of them when they are sick. Kids need a mother for scraped knees-”

Rossi stood up abruptly, “Ma’am with the utmost respect, you are currently the most harmful thing in my son’s life. Did you think I just leave him to fix himself when he is sick or hurt? Do you think I just tell him to tough it? My job requires me to both be tough and empathic and I am planning to pass down how to be both down to Spencer.”

“You might also want to make sure Spencer realizes this is America and not whatever country you came from, he needs to remember to speak english,” The teacher called after him.

Rossi turned around and looked her dead in the eye from the doorway, “I was born and raised in Long Island. I don't know what country you are referring to.” 

Ellen’s conference would go smoother but she would come out the other end just as annoyed. She refused to tell Rossi about what was said. 

Spencer and Stephen found themselves being prodded more and more by their teachers. Asked invasive questions about their home life: if their parents ever hit them, if they were happy, if they were ever punished. One time a teacher asked Stephen if he minded sharing his mother with Spencer considering they weren’t really brothers. Stephen looked at her confused before saying, “sharing is caring and my mom says we need to love everyone.”

Spencer piped up next to him quietly, “Love thy neighbor as yourself, Father Otto says it all the time.” 

As the year seemed to wind down so did the teacher’s questions. The boys weren’t going to be their problem next year seeing as they were both star students. They didn’t get their intended outcome but they also had nothing that they could call social services other than their deep rooted belief of raising children. 

For Father’s Day Spencer gave him a card he had made in class. It was covered in purple and had letters written all around it in a seemingly random pattern. It was perfect. Rossi put it on his desk at work. Stephen overheard Rossi telling Spencer that and asked if his dad had put the card on his desk. Rossi lied and said he hadn’t looked, the truth was that Gideon had looked at the card when he had delivered it to him with confusion before putting it in a desk drawer. 

Ellen told him about how her and Stephen were going to visit family for two weeks in the summer. Spencer seemed uninterested in a vacation when Rossi mentioned it which was nice to hear considering the only vacation activity he really enjoyed was hunting and with how accident prone Spencer was he wasn’t sure he was ready for that disaster waiting to happen. When showing Spencer places to go however Spencer became fascinated with the maps and figuring out routes. So Rossi gave him an atlas to draw all over and would point to two completely different towns in different states and let Spencer figure out how to get there like a maze. While Spencer worked on his maps, Rossi would work on his transcripts and reports. 

That summer Spencer wanted to have the Hobbit read to him. Rossi read to him about the travels of Bilbo Baggins and the trickery of Smaug. Then Rossi would go and work on disproving Satanic Cults existing. Instead he talked about how cults were structured and how every Satanic activity found was false accusations, delusional people who thought they could hear the devil, or bored teenagers. He wondered if Spencer would ever be a bored teenager participating in vandalism and other misdemeanors, he had been. That weekend Rossi made sure they went to church. 

This reputation in the Bureau was becoming a strange contradiction. He was described as a dedicated worker and family man while also being described as a “part-timer” and a womanizer. All accusations were true to some degree. He did more case files that could be solved from the desk then any other field worker, but he also went into the field with partially dragging feet and as infrequently as he could manage. He worked hard for Spencer and dedicated all the time he could for him, but his ways around women at work got him labeled as a “Casanova” at the same time. He couldn’t be bothered with reputation though, it was all just stupid office polotics that didn’t bother him. What bothered him was when Gideon would make half comments about him being a Casanova and ask if he had slept with anyone’s wife. Rossi knew that he was trying to see if Ellen and him had slept together. They hadn’t and honestly Rossi was sick of hearing people question their relationship. It was a friendship and a strong one at that. He tried not to bring his negative mood to Spencer but he seemed to feel it. He would lean himself against Rossi’s legs and continue working on his maps. Just a small interaction, yet it made everything better. 

It was one of those days, Gideon had just come back from a case (that Rossi helped consult from his desk for) and was being an asshole. Some woman in management who he had fooled around with was asking him out and persistent even after he said no three times. He just wanted peace and quiet and then when he went to pick Spencer up from Science Camp he found out that Spencer had had a full meltdown. Signing “stop” repeatedly, refusing to touch the slime they were making and curling down into himself. The counselor said that he seemed highly against touch when they were trying to move him and his mouth was moving though no words were coming out. When he was brought out into the hall and was allowed to calm down he couldn’t explain anything that had occurred or why he had broken down. Rossi thanked them and got Spencer in his car all buckled in and drove home. He was pulsing negative energy and Spencer seemed to only feed on it being more agitated then normally and pulling at his shirt like he didn’t want it on anymore. 

“Hey passerotto, you doing alright?” Rossi asked, glancing to the back seat. Spencer’s only response was pulling at his seat belt as well. 

When they got home Spencer seemed more with it. He was still agitated but it was greatly decreased with the familiar surrounding. Rossi let him go upstairs to his room and started on dinner. They didn’t talk about what happened. Rossi only asked if Spencer wanted to stay there and Spencer had told him yes. That night while Rossi was working on case files Spencer came down and laid his head in Rossi’s lap. Rossi shifted his papers to accommodate and just enjoyed the silent love. 

The rest of camo went without incident. Spencer seemed to soak up all the new knowledge. When Stephen came back from his vacation, they swapped information: Stephen about his relatives and all the cool things he did, Spencer repeated facts he had learned verbatim to Stephen. Ellen and Rossi watched the two boys on the playset. 

“My parents were pushing that I move closer to them now that I’m not tied to Gideon’s workplace.” 

Rossi kept his eyes forward, not glancing over. He knew Ellen didn’t want a face to face, she wanted a mock confession. “Oh? What did you tell her?”

“I told her about Spencer and all of Stephen’s friends.”

“Did she accept that?”

“She couldn’t understand how I could take care of another man’s son and asked if we were sleeping together. If that’s why Gideon left me.”

“I’m getting kind of tired of people accusing us of that.” 

“Yep. Does Spencer ever talk in something other than repetitions?”

“Not really, although he seems to communicate when he’s overwhelmed through sign. Though truth be told when he gets overwhelmed he is almost completely non-verbal. Stroke of luck I taught him it really.”

“Are you concerned for him socially? Stephen is over there telling stories and Spencer is just listing off facts.”

“They seem happy, I’m not going to get mad at him because he doesn’t perfectly fit in. He’s smart and of course I’m concerned about his social levels. But he’s happy. As long as he’s happy I don’t care what he does. Well as long as it isn’t a crime.”

Ellen nodded and twisted her hands nervously, “I’m so scared I won’t be enough and that Stephen won’t actually be happy. That he will just act happy when he gets old to please me. He wants to make me happy, he doesn’t ask about Gideon anymore because he noticed the change in my mood. He shouldn’t have to deal with that.” 

“We have good kids, we now have to remember to let them continue and help them along.”

Stephen continued passing the ball back and forth with Spencer. The same activity they had done when they first met. They still did it all the time. Soon however they moved towards the play structures. Playing a strange version of tag where they were both it and not it. Running up the stairs and going down the slide. A constant circle, neither broke from the route until Stephen decided he was going to hide behind the slide when Spencer started to come down. When he popped out trying to scare Spencer, Spencer instead tagged him right back before running as fast as he could toward Rossi. Spencer’s toe caught on air and he went flying forwards getting a face full of wood chips. Rossi didn’t move, wanting to see what Spencer was going to do. Spencer just jumped up and continued running. Only now Rossi could see that he had a bloody nose. 

“Papa!” He yelled before jumping, grabbing Rossi firmly like a safe ground. 

“Hey passerotto, you okay? You need a tissue for that nose?” 

Spencer just looked confused and wiped his nose, seeming surprised by the blood. He looked up at Rossi moving his hands like he was washing them, “Clean up time?” 

Ellen pulled out a tissue from her purse, “Here you go Spence.” 

By now Stephen was over and saw the blood. He seemed very squish at the mess and had backed away from it. The day was over, about a half hour earlier then normal but it would have to do. 

That night after his bath Rossi noticed that Spencer had a small bruise on his knee. Rossi pointed it out to him asking if it hurt, Spencer just shrugged it off. 

Before they knew it summer was over. But Spencer’s first day of first grade was a fanfare, mainly because him and Stephen were in different classes. Spencer and Stephen both didn’t seem to like this arrangement when they first found out. By the first day of school they were more willing that was until Spencer’s teacher Mrs. Bennit asked Spencer to introduce himself in front of everyone. All the other kids had no problems other than a little shyness saying their names and something they liked. Spencer only said, “My name is Spencer.” 

When the class repeated back, “Hi Spencer!” HIs eyes went wide and he shrunk back. 

Mrs. Bennit kept pushing however, “What’s something you like Spencer?”

Spencer just looked at her with wide eyes before saying quietly, “Sudoku?”

Mrs. Bennit seemed taken back by this, “Spencer, sudoku is an older kid puzzle. Do you like to color or draw maybe? Please don’t lie in the future.” 

He just nodded his head. 

That weekend Ray paid his monthly visit. He had brought a new sudoku book to make up for the not being able to come last month. Upon receiving the book Spencer handed it back to Ray shaking his head, “Spencer, sudoku is an older kid puzzle.” 

Ray looked at him like he had just grown a second head, he knew that Spencer would often parrot back information especially rules but he couldn’t think of who would have told him sudoku was for older kids. “Spence, who told you that?”

Spencer seemed confused by this, last year they had had problems with the kindergarten teachers asking invasive questions but they never had to ask who told him. Ray held out two fists, he shook the right fist, “Did an adult say that or,” he shook his left fist, “did a kid tell you that?”

Spencer tapped his right fist. 

“Okay. Did your teacher tell you that?”

Spencer nodded and signed yes, “Pen in trouble?” 

Ray chuckled at Spencer parroting back Stephen’s words, “No Spencer, you're not in trouble. You can do sudoku, it's for whoever can do it. Don’t worry, you’re just as smart as the older kids. That’s why she got confused.”

Spencer nodded before taking the book and settling down with his colors. He started working on the first problem with a little smile on his face. Ray chuckled and settled down to work on his crossword. Throwing out some of the questions every once and awhile, not really expecting Spencer to know. He never minded babysitting Spencer for Rossi. They both just pretended to not know each other’s business to watch Spencer and everything was fine. If anyone asked Rossi, he had no knowledge of anything illegal happening. If anyone asked Ray, he had an FBI agent looking the other way for him, so don’t cross him. They both pretended like this could go on forever. 

Ray reheated some mac ‘n cheese from the fridge for Spencer’s lunch, when a call came in. 

“Rossi residence.”

“Hey Ray, it’s Dave. Listen, a case just came up that I have to go on. It’s pretty bad, it might be a couple days. Would you mind watching Spencer until it’s over? Ellen can probably take him after Monday if you really need-”

“It’s fine Dave, I’ll just call the restaurant and tell them I’m spending a couple extra days with my godson. That’s the nice thing about being in charge: no one can fire you for it.”

“Thanks so much! Is Spencer close to the phone?”

Ray pulled the phone’s cord tight bringing it over to Spencer, “Say hi to papa.”

“Papa!” 

“Hey passerotto, be good for Uncle Ray okay? I need to be on an adventure for a couple days, catch some villains. Love you okay?” 

Spencer did the ‘I love you’ sign to the phone, Ray chuckled taking the phone back, “He signed ‘I love you’ back. Good luck, see you in a couple days. You might need to talk to Spencer’s teacher when you get back though.” 

Rossi’s groan could be heard right through the line, “Dam, I was hoping for a peaceful school year for him.”

The rest of the week went fine. Rossi got back from the case on Wednesday. It had been a lot of driving and he was bone tired but seeing Spencer’s face light up upon seeing him made him remember why it was all worth it. 

“Hero beats villain!” Another phrase he had picked up from Stephen. 

“My passerotto! Yep, the villain's all gone!” Rossi responded grinning, trying not to think of all the prostitutes gutted like deer after enduring hours of sexual abuse. The man who had been doing it had been yelling about how they were temptresses and asking for it, how he was doing everyone a favor by taking care of them. The unsub hadn’t even shown any remorse and even smirked saying that he would get out of here soon because no one cared about a whore. 

Spencer didn’t understand any of that. All he knew were new facts he wanted to share. Rossi was happy to allow him to directly recite his teacher’s words and lessons about how to sound out words. This was the only time that Rossi could get his son to talk so much, he was never going to cut it off, so when Ray did cut it off he felt a little annoyed. 

“Dave, we need to talk about something. Spence, how about you go work on your latest map?” Spencer was trying to figure out how to get from Portland Maine to Portland Oregan. 

Rossi groaned but turned to his friend and followed him into the study that was attached to the family room. He poured himself a finger of scotch and did the same for Ray. 

“You’re going to have problems with this new teacher too. She already told Spence that he couldn’t do sudoku and has told him to stop lying at least once. Wouldn’t be surprised if it was more. Mainly because this isn’t the most traditional of home lifes.” 

Rossi downed his drink, sighing, “I’ll set up a meeting sometime and pray I don’t get a case before I’m supposed to go. Really thank you for everything Ray.”

To say the teacher meeting was a success would be pushing it but it wasn’t a disaster either. Mrs. Bennit was understanding and even overly sympathetic to Spencer’s “family situation” as she put it. When it came to the academics Rossi brought one of Spencer’s old sudoku books and explained to her that they had just finished reading The Hobbit over the summer. He told her about how Spencer could already speak basics in english, italian and ASL. She nodded her head and admitted that Spencer seemed to have a knack for numbers during math time and was definitely picking up sounding out words and reading quicker then most of the other kids. When he asked that the teacher find better methods then accusing Spencer of lying in the future she defended her words by saying Spencer was a unique case and she just treated him like any other imaginative child. 

October rolled around and with it Rossi had to get Spencer ready for Halloween and his birthday while also combatting the amount of uptick in random acts of vandalism that could allude to more sinister things or just be the time of year. He couldn’t miss Halloween again this year. Partly because Spencer wanted to go as Aslan from Narnia and the costume Spencer claimed only worked if Rossi was there too. Stephen was going to be Superman from the comic books he had seen in the store, even though Ellen wouldn’t let him get them yet. 

Spencer’s fifth birthday party was just like all the other’s before it. Except for the fact that Rossi barely got there in time. He had been working a case over that weekend that ended up bleeding into Monday and might have bled into Tuesday if not for the unsub getting overly cocky and literally targeting a cop next. Ray and Carolyn were taking care of Spencer and had called him on Monday asking if he would be home in time for Spencer’s birthday. Spencer woke up on his birthday to no papa. Stephen told him on the bus to school that father’s not showing for birthdays is what father’s did, Spencer was just special because his “dad” was Carolyn but seeing as Carolyn had been there for the past couple days they must have switched. Rossi got home promising to have his files in the next day with just enough time to pick Spencer up from the bus instead of him going home with Stephen. Upon seeing Rossi Spencer’s face had lit up like a christmas tree and he let out a loud shriek of “PAPA!” 

Later when Stephen and Ellen came over for cake and gifts Stephen looked at Rossi and then announced, “I guess they didn’t switch.” 

Halloween was a different tale. So many houses thought that Spencer was the cowardly lion from the Wizard of Oz that after only 20 houses Spencer no longer wanted to keep tricker treating, he just wanted to somehow get the candy. Rossi negotiated with him and they decided that if he announced he was Aslan then he would be teaching them something new which was a good thing. If he just gave up all these other houses wouldn’t know who Aslan was. Spencer nodded and agreed to tell everyone that he was Aslan, with the help from Stephen. At the end of the night they had gone to roughly 50 houses and Ellen and Rossi found themselves carrying the two boys and their haul as they sleepily rested on their parent’s backs. 

In November Spencer came home and recited the entire book he read all by himself today. When Rossi asked him how many times he read it to memorize the whole thing Spencer held up one finger. Rossi pretended to believe him imagining his kid reading the same book for a couple hours just to remember every last detail. 

That Christmas season was a spectacle. Rossi brought Spencer to pick out a tree and Spencer ended up picking out a tree that was full on one side and almost flat on the other. Rossi ended up getting him to agree on a more even tree. They cut it down “together” and then set to decorating it. Spencer had made some ornaments in class and wanted to display them on the tree. The angel at the top of the tree seemed happier that year with the serious ornaments mixed with the arts and craft projects. 

Christmas cards were the same ordeal as always. Spencer wanting to write to Ted Bundy and Charles Manson, both of which were stashed in Rossi’s desk. Carolyn also had sent him an advent calendar that gave him a piece of chocolate everyday with her Christmas card. Spencer hadn’t even gotten through all his Halloween candy and was very excited for this gift. Actual Christmas was a quiet affair of an excited Spencer and lots of colorful wrapping paper flying. Most of the gifts this year were books and puzzles. He looked at each gift like it was precious. But a specific gift from Ray of a monster onesie seemed to be his favorite. He wore it for as long as he could before Rossi made it “for bedtimes only”. 

Over the break Rossi also read a few of the new books with Spencer, amazed at how fast his son seemed to pick up reading and also that he was being truthful at being able to recite whole stories after just a single reading if he read it. If it was read to him he seemed to be able to repeat about 75 percent of it. Rossi just looked on at his wonder child. 

“Passerotto, you are going to be able to do whatever you desire when you are older,” He whispered to a sleeping Spencer as he greeted the new year.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Any comments, critique or otherwise is greatly appreciated.


	5. 1987 Jan-July

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Spencer can read now! Genius kid time!  
> Also again period typical opinions. So people are going to be judgy, harsh and even slightly cruel towards the Rossi household because it is atypical. And Spencer is not going to get anything but the short end of the stick when he melts down or has problems. After all it’s the 80s.   
> If you want angst and people to hate you are going to love this chapter. This is the year the angst starts and it is only going to get worse. So much worse.   
> Also not a full year because more things are going to be happening and this chapter was already over 4000 words.

Once Spencer learned to read it was all over. He read anything he could get his hands on it seemed. He would repeat these things back verbatim. Rossi found himself having to keep books he didn’t want Spencer getting access to in locked rooms or on higher shelves. Spencer’s appetite for knowledge grew as fast as his vocabulary. Rossi had to teach him how to use a dictionary simply so he would stop getting so many questions of how words were pronounced and what they meant. His fascination with maps tripled as he could now read the street names and the places he was going. Soon enough he was giving Rossi detailed instructions on how to get to and from every location. Spencer almost got his hands on Rossi’s case files one day which ended up with Rossi having to explain to Spencer that he had to ask permission before reading things that weren’t books on reachable shelves or the newspaper. 

The ability to read also seemed to jump start his thirst for information about seemingly anything. He wanted to read everything from biology to theology. Rossi once came out from working on dinner to find Spencer sitting on the rug with two books. One a kid's introduction to biology and ecosystems the other being the bible. He couldn’t exactly tell Spencer to not read the bible, but he also didn’t know if he was ready to explain some of the more gruesome parts. 

Everything that Spencer read he remembered and was able to repeat verbatim. Rossi realized why Spencer was able to get into safes and also wondered if his kid had some super power. Doing some research he learned it was called an eidetic memory. It tended to be only for things seen not heard. Rossi became more cautious with everything he let Spencer see. He didn’t want certain images to be trapped in his brain forever. 

When Rossi mentioned Spencer’s talent to Gideon as they worked a case Gideon told him that would be dead useful in the BAU, being able to recall exact information without problems when negotiating, less chance of messing up names, dates or codes. Rossi went on the defensive telling Gideon that Spencer would be subjected to the BAU or any other law enforcement job over his dead body. Rossi claimed that Spencer’s intelligence would be much more suited to be a researcher or developer. After all he was doing this job so his son didn’t have to. 

Ray made jokes about borrowing Spencer as a confident that couldn’t be broken into. Rossi joked back that if Ray involved Spencer in anything even remotely illegal and painted a target on his son’s back it wouldn’t be the other crime lords he had to worry about. 

Stephen was just amazed at his friend’s talents, they started playing a game where Stephen would name a random book and Spencer would parrot the whole thing to him as they played. Stephen decided that it made Spencer into a superhero and that they needed to find his superhero name. 

“Pen what about Bookman?”

“What about Penny for your Thoughts?”

“Pen, the recorder!” 

Ellen had just played along and helped make Spencer a cape when requested. She didn’t really care one way or another, Spencer was just a kid. Carolyn was the same way, she continued to send letters back and forth with Spencer complementing his handwriting and drawings.

For Stephen’s birthday that year Gideon showed his face just in time for Spencer reciting the entirety of  Happy Birthday to You by Dr. Suess. He watched quietly by the door for Spencer to finish before announcing his presence. Stephen was ecstatic at Gideon’s appearance claiming that his birthday candles granted his wish. Gideon gave Stephen his first comic books, Superman and Batman, a gift that Rossi had suggested when Gideon asked him. Stephen was over the moon and didn’t notice his mother’s face go hard when she asked Gideon why he hadn’t been able to stop by for Christmas at all during the break. 

Spencer progressing in leaps and bounds presented Rossi with two main problems. One was that Spencer’s ability to read was becoming better and better making him faster and faster. The second was his thirst for information and material was making it so that it was next to impossible to keep Spencer occupied with any reading material for more than a day. He noticed Spencer’s fascination with maps and so started bringing him travel guides and reports about different cities. Every week Spencer was to pick one state and Rossi would gather as much information as he could. The other place where Rossi was able to keep Spencer more occupied was teaching him to read in italian, with the help of an english to italian dictionary. This opened a whole new area of books and reading experiences. Rossi just tried to make sure his son was entertained enough because he found that when he wasn’t fixated on reading he would get in trouble. Little things like moving too much, making noises, trying out things that he read about, or finding inappropriate reading material. 

However regardless of how much knowledge he gathered, trying to have a conversation with him was often like pulling teeth. It was a strange ask and take. Pauses were a little too long and sometimes Spencer would just break into reciting facts that weren’t completely relevant to the conversation. Classmates and his teacher would cut him off mid rant. Spencer didn’t know that this wasn’t normal, he didn’t mind. But Mrs. Bennit did care and soon Rossi found Spencer coming home with “disciplinary” notes for inappropriate conduct. After three notes a parent teacher conference would be called. Rossi couldn’t go to all the conferences she was requiring because the time of them would mean he would have to not be on a case and also leave work early. He couldn’t afford to do that almost every other week. The principle got involved after he missed the fourth parent teacher conference. Concerns were raised on whether Spencer was acting out for attention after living in a “neglectful” home. 

Rossi had to meet with the principal and explain that Spencer had some problems on the social scale but wasn’t intentionally bad. He also pointed out that Spencer often was being taken care of by afterschool programs and then Ellen. When the principal told him that doesn’t excuse Rossi missing parent-teacher conferences to work with the teacher to best handle Spencer, Rossi almost lost it. Rossi explained that his job with the FBI often made it so there were last minute calls and most of the meetings scheduled were during work hours. The principal looked Rossi once over before announcing that it didn’t matter and child protective services would be called to decide whether Rossi was a fit guardian. 

CPS didn’t know how to handle Spencer. When they asked him what he liked to do he showed them his maps, sudoku and his current books on the state of Mississippi. When they asked him about Rossi he started saying italian endearments and signing words of love. When they asked if he had ever missed a meal or wasn’t given food he recited his entire schedule fit with breakfast, making lunch and snack, having snack at school, having lunch at school, having another snack afterschool, dinner and how often he got desert. He also recited off his favorite snacks and told them that on Sundays he got pancakes if papa was home and scrambled eggs if he was staying with Ray. They asked him if his father ever hit him and Spencer’s eyes went wide telling them, “Papa fights the bad guys.” When they asked him again saying that wasn’t an answer Spencer hands started moving like he was trying to say something but he couldn’t figure out what. When a social worker tried to touch him he screamed. Rossi broke into the room hearing Spencer’s scream and without touching him started talking, not really saying anything, just quiet, calm italian. He put his hands out palms up, arms spread slightly, like inviting a hug. Spencer didn’t take it but it wasn’t lost on the social workers that he began to calm down.

"Ecco il passerotto,” Rossi soothed, “What was it this time?” Rossi waved his right hand, “The questions.” Rossi waved his left hand, “Something else.” 

Spencer pointed to Rossi’s right hand. Rossi stood up nodding, “I would suggest you are all careful about questions you ask.”

Normally the social worker would have put down that the child was traumatized due to abuse suffered from his home environment. But seeing how the parent was able to calm down the child and also didn’t touch him once while doing so and nothing in the house suggested abuse, about the exact opposite to be exact, they didn’t put that down. 

One of the social workers while going through the house muttered about how the social imbalance was probably more due to no maternal presence. However after talking with Ellen and reading through all the letters from Carolyn. Along with Spencer’s response when they asked who Carolyn was and he told them, “Carolyn is Pen’s version of ‘dad’.” 

The referring to himself in the third person also raised concerns until Ellen and Rossi told them that was a direct quote from Stephen that he mimicked often. In the end they couldn’t find anything they could really pin on Rossi. Sure his kid was weird and might be considered unbalanced but not in any way that they could pinpoint current abuse. 

In the end Rossi was told they were sorry for the disturbance and Spencer was still confused. Rossi tried his best to explain it to him that night. 

“Your teacher keeps giving you penalties for talking out of turn or about topics that are off topic. Those penalties mean I have to go and talk to her, but I have my cases so I couldn’t attend. So then I got penalties. Eventually my penalties meant that the people that assess whether or not a child is being taken care of came. But now everything is resolved, you are going to stay with me and we are going to try not to get more penalties.”

Spencer’s attitude changed drastically after that. He would only speak if the teacher called on him and wouldn’t ask questions. With Ellen and Stephen he would almost always need prompting to talk, but they didn’t notice anything too different. Even with Rossi he would wait for Rossi to ask him a question about what he was “researching” before launching into his rants. He also started cutting himself off if someone said his name while he was talking. This was his way of making sure he would never be taken from his papa, if he got penalties they could take papa and he could not let that happen. 

His teacher thought it was the discipline that her message finally got across and she patted herself on the back for it. In return to keep the student quiet she started to give him the introductions to multiplication, something taught at the end of second grade but she figured it couldn’t hurt to reward his good behavior. 

She did get upset when Spencer made two mother’s day cards, because it wasn’t correct. Especially because Spencer referred to Carolyn as his “dad”. But the principal had also given her a warning to not keep calling Mr. Rossi in unless Spencer was a behavioral problem and he wasn’t. 

For father’s day Ellen got the surprise, Stephen had made a card for Gideon as normal giving it to Rossi to deliver. When Rossi asked why he was holding two cards Stephen gave him a card saying because Rossi was a father and if Spencer got to share his mom then Spencer could share his dad. Rossi did not put his card from Stephen on his desk, he instead hung both on the bulletin board in the kitchen. 

That same June the Bureau gave the BAU a gift in the form of a larger office space. They claimed that their success rate over the past nine years had allowed it. Rossi knew it was because the unit was having another expansion and they couldn’t justify sticking more then 5 agents into that bunker space regardless of how many rooms they now had. It was nice to feel appreciated and to see interest in being in their area of the FBI growing as well. Rossi was hopeful it would help with the workload. Turned out that the workload was actually increasing so they had been forced to add more workers. Max Ryan was starting to loose his mind with a killer that had been dubbed “The Keystone Killer” in Philly, he had now been killing for over a year and the case had gone cold yet again. It made Rossi think of the weird bird murders that he knew Gideon returned to every once and while. He was pretty sure that is why Gideon bought a cabin an hour outside of Roanoke. Rossi wondered what case would be his obsession and unfinished business. He wondered if he held onto Spencer enough if he wouldn’t get one. He purposely kept his desk decorated with Spencer’s drawings and maps just to keep himself from getting too deep and losing himself. A tether to something that wasn’t the disgusting underbelly of the american communities. 

That underbelly would threaten his son again that July. This time it would come in the form of a hostage situation. It was a charismatic cult leader, his followers spoke in some strange code and called Rossi an imposter if he tried to talk to them. But then when he said his name was David Rossi the lead of that small group of followers turned to him and said, “We picked up your son from camp today. He will grow in the light.” 

Rossi felt his blood go cold. When he tried to ask more questions about where his son was all they would say was he was an imposter, he didn’t have the code words to get any farther. He had called Ray to see if he had picked up Spencer, in which Ray responded that he was just about to call and ask what was wrong because his instructors claimed Spencer had gotten picked up early by an FBI agent saying it was important and Spencer was in danger. 

Rossi crumpled looking at his desk covered in Spencer’s drawings. His mind was racing, they hadn’t found out where exactly the cult was located. All they knew was that this man had been grabbing college dropouts and then making them into mindless soldiers that then carried out robberies at gun, food and clothing stores. They referred to their way as “seeing the light” which sounded like some sort of knock off religion to Rossi. The worst part was because the current members were seemingly unresponsive to interrogation and the FBI/Rossi hadn’t gotten any letters or calls they couldn’t even negotiate for Spencer’s safe return. It was wreaking havoc on Rossi so much so that Gideon had to step into the case to help stabilize it. Rossi refused to go home that night. His clothes were crumpled and he looked like a complete wreck, but he told Gideon he couldn’t go home to an empty house that had so much evidence of Spencer. Gideon had gone to his house a few times and they had a cop stationed outside in case anything was tried to be delivered there. 

Spencer on the other hand was confused. People had claimed they were FBI and that they needed to take him to his dad. This confused him for two reasons, one was why would anyone need to take him to Carolyn and two Uncle Ray was supposed to pick him up today in three hours not now. The instructors however told him he had to go and he didn’t want to cause a fuss so he did. Once he was in the van, it became apparent these people were not working with his papa. He wondered if these were the friends that Uncle Ray had that Rossi always told him to be careful around. They all talked funny too. They wouldn’t answer any of his questions, though that was normal, but they also didn’t seem to really realize he was talking at all and when they did they called him an imposter. So they were weird, but papa always told him to “play nice with others” and school always told him to “be friends.” 

When they got to their destination a tall broad man with a too big smile welcomed Spencer in. He called Spencer “his child” which made Spencer feel uncomfortable because he didn’t know this man. In fact Spencer wanted to go home and there were too many people touching him all a sudden. He didn’t like their hands on him, he was wearing short sleeves so he could feel their skin, rough against his smooth skin. They pulled off his shirt and started to man handle him into a rough robe. He couldn’t do it. His brain wanted it all to stop, they all kept saying “little brother” and he just wanted them to stop. When he tried failing he found his wrists pulled together behind his back and fastened with a rough twine. He really didn’t like the feeling. He started to struggle and curl down. He wanted it off, he wanted his papa and more then anything he wanted them to all be quiet. Spencer started to try and get free, he tried banging his hands against his head to find that the restraints wouldn’t let him move his arms at all. His entire body seemed to be fighting against him. The people around him just kept talking although they all seemed agitated now. Their words were harsher, things like “little brother”, “imposter” and “betrayer”. Spencer just wanted everything to be quiet, he just wanted the rough material to be replaced with his normal cotton clothes, he just wanted to be home; his schedule said he should be going home with Ray now. He felt a small prick on his arm and everything went dark. 

Rossi found himself wishing that they had given him a ransom demand. Something he could try and negotiate with. That they had any line of conversation. He tried every word he could think of the he thought cults would use: brother, sister, light, dark, his name, Spencer’s name, mother, father, uncle, aunt, sight, and so many more. Nothing. Just more calls of being an imposter. When he asked them how he could “see the light” they simply told him that either he was chosen or he wasn’t. Then they told him something that made him even more scared, “That it would all be over soon.” It made him think of Jonestown or Charles Manson’s attempts. He didn’t think he could handle Spencer being the center of either of those. Spencer who just had been so excited that he was going to learn real magic using science. Spencer who hadn’t even gotten his sixth birthday yet. Rossi wondered if all of the doubting and situations that Spencer had been put into because of him was because the boy was a bad luck magnet or if it was fate telling Rossi he should have never taken Spencer in. Someone else could have given him a much better life: where he had a real mom and dad, where he had more time with his parents, where teachers and social workers didn’t seem out to get him. Rossi decided that he would make sure Spencer was safe and then figure out if the best option was putting Spencer up for adoption. 

The demands came the second day, they wanted a spaceship so that they could go and join the space people and avoid earth’s destruction. They had abducted a total of ten children as they sent a picture of each child dressed in crudely made robes. Rossi’s heart almost stopped when Spencer’s picture looked like Spencer was asleep, which didn’t make sense considering all the other children looked like they had been crying and awake, and Rossi had a moment where he thought it was a picture of Spencer’s dead body. It made him think of James’ grave. He dismissed the thought, Spencer had to be fine. He was not going to have another dead kid. 

The distance between the ten children and when they were abducted told Rossi there were at least 20 members, including the ones that they currently had in custody. Rossi would be fine with the negotiating if they wanted anything less than a rocket ship. He didn’t know how he was going to swing that one fake or real and the message had just been dropped off with no way to contact them. When he tried to ask the people in custody about a “spaceship” or a “rocket ship” they just told them that was how they were going to ascend into the light. It had now been almost 18 hours since the children were taken and Rossi probably had more coffee in his system then blood. Gideon and Cole were now helping on the case. Well Gideon had taken a six hour nap while Cole started to help and then she just didn’t leave. Cole’s expertise was sex trafficking and was familiar with abductions through that. Rossi was thankful for her help until Gideon had woken up and she told him he should sleep. 

The solution came in the next letter delivered to them, this time it had a number they could call to let them know when the preparations had been made. It simply asked “what was taking so long, after all they had all those spaceships in the museum.” It also came with a number they could call. While they dragged out an old replica from the museum, they traced the call to that number. The arrest was almost too easy. Most of the kids were just scared and confused and Spencer was sedated because as one of the other kids put it, he wouldn’t stop fighting. 

Rossi requested a week vacation that was granted considering the circumstances. That night he asked Spencer if he could sleep in Spencer’s room, while Spencer seemed slightly apprehensive it was better than sleeping in papa’s room, right now he just wanted familiarity. He kept rubbing his hands over his arms like he was cold, but when asked he said he wasn’t cold. Rossi knew that Spencer didn’t like hugs but he needed to hold him close so he did, he held him close to his chest until Spencer started squirming to get away. If it wasn’t for the fact he had been up for over 24 hours he probably wouldn’t have even slept. The next morning he made Spencer pancakes even though it wasn’t Sunday. Spencer didn’t like that, repeating that it was “Saturday and cheerios were for Saturdays.” Rossi relented quickly just wanting his son to be happy. 

Ray came by on Sunday to see his god son in the flesh. He made a joke to Rossi about whether the job put Rossi or Spencer at more risk. That joke rattled around Rossi’s head the rest of the day. That night after Spencer went to bed he poured himself some scotch and put on Tony Bennet. Thoughts of whether he should stop fighting so hard to keep Spencer, if he instead was just being selfish and ruining Spencer’s childhood. Spencer was still young enough that he could get adopted with little fuss, but the selfish part of Rossi didn’t want to give Spencer up. He decided he would talk it over with Ellen and Ray. 

Turned out Ellen and Ray thought he was being a complete idiot and pretty much ripped him a new one. Ellen told him she had never heard something so stupid and that was he really going to do that to Spencer and Stephen, that right now was some of the most influential years and was he going to abandoned Spencer just because things got tough. Ray just told him that if he left Spencer that Rossi would find himself with nothing except the BAU and then that he would find a way to take that away from Rossi too. 

The rest of the week Spencer seemed to be fine, as long as Rossi stuck to the routine they had set, deviations seemed to make Spencer more prone to melt down then usual but by the end of the week everything seemed to be back to normal. Spencer even got to learn the science magic he missed, it was making bottle rockets with soda and mentos. Spencer made his look like a rocket ship, babbling on about the rocket that went to the moon. Rossi just nodded along and appreciated the fact that Spencer was there and unharmed. 


	6. 1987 August-December

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do you want some good fluff? Well that’s nice because this chapter Spencer learns about bullying!  
> That being said, warning for slurs and language.   
> I like making hateable teachers I guess. They all mean well and would probably be great with other kids. 
> 
> Chapter is shorter then average, but I didn't want to go into the next year.

August rolled around and Rossi’s nerves and doubts had settled. The office from the school called and asked if he would like to test Spencer again now that he could read to see what grade might be a good fit. They suggested not skipping more than one grade at a time with Spencer’s age but in case Rossi wanted to know where his son stood academically. The test was “easy” for Spencer and the results didn’t feel like a huge surprise: reading level was that of an 8th grader but comprehension was that of a 5th grader, math level was that of a second semester 3rd grader. With that knowledge Rossi agreed to skip second grade and put him in third, he wanted Spencer to be challenged and learn new things. He wasn’t worried about Spencer and Stephen being apart because they had had different teachers last year and still had their standing Sunday afternoons, plus anytime after school and when Rossi went on cases. The tester also told Rossi that Spencer was most likely a child prodigy and if Rossi wanted to cultivate that and maybe get him tutors… Rossi cut him off and told them that his son’s education would come through the typical channels and if he wanted to learn more about something he could either read it or find a place to learn it. 

Rossi’s second order of business for that month was trying to prevent Spencer from ever getting kidnapped again. It required Rossi to have to talk about things he would rather not have to say to a soon to be six year old but he also knew that Spencer’s safety mattered more. He started by telling Spencer to never go with someone if he didn’t know them, regardless of what teachers say. If they have FBI badges ask for their department to see if that throws them off. He told Spencer to ask them if Rossi was hurt or safe. Then he said if they didn’t say Rossi was badly injured to ask for the code word. Rossi decided the code word would be “segreta”. He let Ellen and Ray know this. He explained to Spencer to just go along with whatever the kidnapper wanted within reason, that the longer Spencer was able to play along and be good the safer he would be and the longer Rossi had to find him. Rossi hated saying those words to Spencer, but he knew that if this ever happened again he didn’t want Spencer to be sedated again and that they were lucky it was just sedation. 

The third grade teacher, Mr. Albert, was an elderly man who had served time in the army. Rossi found himself talking to him about being in the marines. Rossi felt confident that this teacher would be good, seeing as he congratulated Rossi for raising a child so smart already. 

The strict unwavering routine that Mr. Albert put in place for his students made Spencer excel and love his class as well, nothing ever changed or went over time by more than a few minutes. There were no days where he just decided to not do math, writing or reading in favor of another subject. They also started to learn basic US history for an hour at the end of every Friday. The class was always quiet while working and kids that fidgetted too much were told to stop. That is where Spencer started to fail, rubbing at his arms, tapping his fingers or bouncing in his seat would get him called out in front of everyone. Spencer thought about those paper slips from last year and his papa telling him about how he could be taken away like the characters in his books. Well papa didn’t say it would be exactly like the characters in his books but every character would lose their parents and Spencer didn’t want that. So Spencer sat as still as he could, doodling on extra paper and hiding the fact that he was running his nails up and down his leg under his desk. 

The second problem with this school year came from the fact that Spencer was 5 almost 6 in a classroom full of 8 year olds. The older boys had learned from somewhere that the strongest picked on the weakest to show their strength. So pick on Spencer they did. They did all the things they had seen typical bullies do to them in the past or on TV shows: taking Spencer’s lunch and pushing Spencer down. Spencer watched as sometimes when kids fought the teachers would give them those paper slips so he didn’t fight back. But when he cried once after Francis had pushed him off the slide, Mr. Albert didn’t give Francis a piece of paper, Mr. Albert told Spencer to “stop crying and man up, don’t disappoint your father.”

Spencer didn’t want to disappoint Rossi, so he took everything the bullies dished out. He would hide his tears and when Rossi asked how the day was he saw no reason to lie, learning all these new things was amazing and he was learning about people too! 

Spencer’s birthday that year was a nightmare. Ray was dealing with “business” and was being tracked so he didn’t want to risk coming down. Carolyn came down a day early because she hadn’t been able to get off the day after Spencer’s birthday and would have to leave by 5 p.m. on Spencer’s birthday because she had to get back. Ellen and Stephen were steady and Rossi had been planning to be a rock, all his vacation preapproved. Then a high priority case came in for a child abduction and Gideon, Ryan and Cole were all on other cases in different parts of the country and Rossi’s success record with child cases were high so they called him in, on Spencer’s birthday. Rossi wanted to throw a tantrum like a kid, but instead he told Spencer he would be home later and hoped it was the truth. Ellen just gave his a face full of disappointment and pity when Spencer gave Rossi a little fist bump that he would be okay. Stephen just seemed excited to be having Pen’s birthday at his house. When 5:30 rolled around and it was just Ellen, Stephen and Spencer there, Stephen realized that something was wrong. 

“Pen where’s your papa? Even your ‘dad’ was here.”

Spencer just shrugged and tried not to cry hearing Mr. Alberts words of “boys don’t cry.” 

“Wanna make the rules of ‘dad’s so that teachers know?” Stephen asked, they had been planning to do that soon but Halloween was on a Saturday this year and they wouldn’t get to it this Sunday. 

Spencer nodded, brightening at the idea. Ellen wanted to object but she was curious about what their rules were.

The final result was this:

“Rules for being a Dad

By Stephen Gideon and Spencer Rossi

  1. Writes letters
  2. Not around a whole lot, just special occasions
  3. There at Birthdays but not for whole time
  4. Was in love and married to papa or mommy
  5. Haven’t seen their home
  6. Do they have a home?
  7. Make a card for them on Mother/Father’s day, give to papa/Rossi to deliver
  8. Only know what you tell them
  9. Ask Rossi/papa if you want to know about them
  10. Do not ask Ellen/mommy about them
  11. Papa/Mommy say that they love you, but dad will never say it”



When Rossi finished the case it was 10 pm, but Ellen still let him in. She smiled sadly and told him Spencer was upset but still had a good day. Rossi carefully crept into Stephen’s room where he had requested bunk beds for all of Spencer’s sleepovers. He tucked Spencer in just a little more snugly and placed a light kiss on his hair that was slowly becoming a lion’s mane. The next morning he called into work saying that his vacation day was going to be taken on Halloween. 

That Halloween Spencer had wanted to be Luke Skywalker and Stephen was being Hans Solo. They both got props that lit up making them love their costumes even more. Running from house to house and collecting candy in their pillow cases. Ellen and Rossi just watched content to see their boys so happy. Well until they ran into one of Spencer’s bullies. Francis pushed Spencer and ripped his pillowcase from his hands with the sneer, “freak.” Stephen tried to stop it and protect Spencer but he found himself face to face with Francis’s older brother who was an eighth grader. Spencer kept telling himself to not cry, but Stephen didn’t have those thoughts as he let out a big wail for his mom. 

Francis’s brother, Joseph, was not about to go up against adults but found himself trapped especially when one of the parents grabbed his brother to ask what was happening. When he tried to deescalate the situation saying, “Francis just said he was friends with the kid here.” The adult who he was guessing was the father just growled out, “Don’t lie, I know what bullying looks like.” Joseph cursed to himself, why his brother picked the one kid that had an overprotective parent, that was probably why the kid’s brother was crying. 

“Uh, listen sir it’s Halloween, things happen. How about I help you pick this up and we just go our separate ways.” He felt relief when the father nodded. 

“That’s all I would ask anyway, passerotto is your bag ripped?” Rossi asked, Spencer held it up and then signed “small” while shrugging. Rossi nodded and turned back to Francis and Joseph, “No damage so no bill. Have a good Halloween, be safe.” 

Stephen had quieted down and Spencer was just picking up all his candy from the sidewalk. They continued to trick or treat for another hour before Stephen and Spencer were no longer carrying their bags and instead were yawning. Ellen pulled Rossi away before they separated, “That didn’t look like the first time that that boy picked on Spence.” Rossi nodded his understanding and then carried a tired Spencer to bed. 

The next day when Rossi asked Spencer if Francis picked on him at school Spencer just shook his head and stayed quiet. That week when Rossi reached out to Mr. Albert, he was told it was just “boys being boys”. That statement worried Rossi because he had seen what “boys” could do, but at the same time everyone went through it and he wasn’t going to shelter Spencer, he knew he couldn’t. So he just let it go.

Francis continued to be cruel to Spencer and calling him names: freak, faggot, nerd, weirdo, sissy and geek. Spencer looked up every word in the dictionary. He understood all of them except faggot because it was listed as a bundle of sticks or cigarettes. When he tried to ask the librarian what it meant she told him not to say that word. When he asked his papa, he was told it was a bad word and a bad thing and to not worry about it. So Spencer put it on the back burner as something he would learn when he got older. 

Rossi could tell something was wrong but he figured if it was big Spencer would tell him. He had his hands full with cases anyway. Rossi made sure that he could be there for bedtime at bare minimum as his workload increased. Tucking Spencer into bed with a host of soft plush animals that Spencer could give a book worth of facts on. He would give Spencer a soft kiss on his forehead and smooth back the mess of curls as Spencer burrowed into his blankets. That kid was always cold. Then making sure the night light was on he would turn off the light and close the door. Half the time he would have an urge to check in on him again as if he was going to just vanish into thin air. 

That year Rossi wasn’t quick enough to catch the Christmas cards going out. Spencer had decided that he wanted to write out the labels and put on the stamps. He wrote the prison addresses on Ted Bundy’s and Charles Manson’s and then popped them in a public mailbox, not their home mailbox. Rossi couldn’t get them out. Rossi just hoped that they wouldn’t write back and he also really hoped they did not make the connection. Mr. Albert also had his classes make soldiers overseas, so Spencer made about an extra hundred cards and presented them eagerly. Rossi took them down to the organization that was hosting the holiday cards being sent. The lady smiled and told Spencer that he did a great job and thanked him. 

A week before Christmas break Rossi had his parent-teacher conference with Mr. Albert finally. It was supposed to be back in November but Rossi’s schedule never aligned well enough. He was just grateful that this teacher seemed understanding to the circumstances. The words he heard were not what he was expecting.

“You’ve raised a sissy boy. He can’t even stick up for himself, where’s that marine in him?” Mr. Albert demanded after going over how well Spencer was doing in classes. 

“Pardon?” Rossi asked, confusion flooding his voice. 

“He never stands up for himself, luckily he’s not sobbing all over the place like some girl but you can tell he’s close.”

Rossi felt his temper rising, “My son just turned six, he shouldn’t be worrying about standing up for himself against kids two years older than him. Not yet. Why hadn’t I been informed about this, I reached out to you before and you told me not to worry. That ‘boys will be boys’. Is this the reason my son came home and asked me what faggot meant?”

“Well you can’t blame the kids, the way Spencer acts he practically has a target painted on his back. Not to mention that with his hair getting longer he is kind of looking like a girly fairy.” 

It took all of Rossi’s self control to not punch Mr. Albert right then and there, “I’m going to remind you that Spencer is 6. If you would stop them from doing it to a first grader, stop them from doing it to him. Thank you Mr. Albert but I really don’t need a third teacher telling me how I’m ruining my son, although you would be the first to tell me it's because I’m too nice. At least you didn’t tell me to get a wife.” 

With that Rossi walked out the door. That Sunday he tried not to be jealous as Ellen and him shared coffee and Ellen talked about how Stephen was making friends and how amazing his teacher was. He wondered if it was too much to ask to find one who wouldn’t judge Spencer. Then as he watched Stephen and Spencer play knights and dragons with old costumes and stuffed animals he realized he had. 

A Christmas card came in the mail with no return address. It was addressed to Spencer and that made Rossi immediately cautious, but he wasn’t able to sneak it by Spencer in time for him to not see his name. They were supposed to be getting a letter from Carolyn that day. When Spencer ripped into it thinking it was from Carolyn but noting the handwriting was different he pulled out a greeting card, in slanting letters it said “Say hi to your daddy for me ~ Charles Manson” Spencer’s eyes went wide.

“They wrote back,” He whispered in awe, then looking up to Rossi, “I have to respond right?”

Rossi was quick to shut down that idea, “No, this is just a greeting card. You're not expected to respond and we already sent out ours.” 

The letter was kept on Spencer’s desk next to all of Carolyn’s cards. Rossi wanted to throw it in the fire and his fingers itched every time he saw it. 

Rossi ended up distracting himself by taking Spencer out to go cut down a tree, they picked a full beauty that took 20 minutes to cut down. That would be the last tree Rossi cut down for 20 years. If he had known that maybe he would have stopped for hot chocolate like Spencer wanted or cherished the experience more. 

That Christmas was its normal small affair, Spencer had asked for books in italian so that he could start learning how to read it. So Rossi and Spencer found themselves cuddled up on the couch watching “It’s a Wonderful Life” and reading italian children's books. Rossi had never felt more content and more right. 

For New Years he thought about the hectic nature of the last year, it was only going to get worse he realized. The BAU was growing and crime wasn’t slowing. He smiled as he sipped his scotch, Ray had called two days ago to say everything was clear again. Everything was hopefully looking up. At midnight he downed the rest of his glass and wandered to Spencer’s bedroom. Watching his sleeping son with his night light glowing illuminating his innocent face Rossi knew that he would bend over backwards to make sure Spencer never ended up doing his job. He would do anything to keep his little boy innocent and happy. 


End file.
